Written by LineStar Daily Fantasy Life Coach @ZeroInDenver.

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Welcome to the NHL Hat Trick.

We get a solid 12-game slate tonight, which also leads to decent Turbo and Express slates if that many games is too overwhelming for you. Like I've said before, there's no shame in skipping the main. The Turbo, Express, Late, and Night slates all pay out real dollars as well.

Something I've been toying with is how to increase the diversity in my lineups using the optimizer. For me, it feels that the optimizer will love certain players or stack combinations and it can be hard to get it to see past that. For example, I'm getting a lot of Florida, Toronto, and Dallas stacks. While that may be fine, I'm not sure that I want any one of those three in 60-70% of my lineups when there's 24 teams playing tonight.

I think adjusting Variance and Exposure can be worth trying. Again, do this on past slates to see what results you can get. If I'm still getting stuck, I might build lineups for teams or lines individually by using the StackFinder and picking and choosing lineups for that.

Anyone have a better way to get more lineup variety? Join us and help us figure out this slate in LineStar Chat

Tonight's Targets

Here's a high level look of team numbers for tonight.

You'll notice I added a metric at the end called "ScoreAgg." This is the sum of a team's GF60, opposing GA60, and the xGF60 and opposing xGA60 from Natural Stat Trick. I've been testing this out as an indicator on teams to focus on (or avoid). Let me know if you find this helpful.

First - a lot of this data might be foreign to most of you, so let me break it down (numbers over the last 10 games):

• W and L: Wins and Losses

• CF%, CF60, CA60: This is Corsi For %, Corsi For/60 minutes, Corsi Allowed/60 minutes

• HDCF60, HDCA60: This is High Danger Corsi For/60 minutes and High Danger Corsi Allowed/60 minutes.

• SF60, SA60: This is Shots For/60 minutes and Shots Allowed/60 minutes.

• SOT: Percentage of shots on target .

• Sh%: The percentage of shots on goal that are goals.

• SCF60, SCA60: Scoring chances for and allowed per 60 minutes

• GF60, GA60: These are goals for and goals allowed per 60 minutes.

I'm overgeneralizing, but I want teams that aren't afraid to shoot the puck. More shot attempts the better. Then I narrow it down more based on teams that are hitting the net and getting goals. Again, really high level stuff. Don't go all in based on one or even a few numbers, but I think it's more useful than just going off of implied goals.

Now let's dig into this slate.

Goaltenders

Kaapo Kahkonen - MIN (DK: $7800, FD: $7300)

This feels like a trap considering his price, matchup, and recent success, but I'm willing to roll with it tonight as Anaheim is only scoring 2.6 goals a game over their last 10 games.

Centers

Mark Scheifele - WPG (DK: $6600, FD: $7700)

Sorry Wings fans, but Detroit is so bad that I just have to stack against them every night. Winnipeg is one of my favorite stacks tonight, but I don't mind Scheifele as a one-off either.

Wingers

Jonathan Marchessault - VGK (DK: $6700, FD: $7400)

Shot volume uber alles. Not a bad matchup tonight either.

Defensemen

Dougie Hamilton - CAR (DK: $7200, FD: $5900)

Dougie is pretty automatic for me. If I can fit him in, I do.

If you take anything away from this, keep in mind that hockey is a high-variance sport. The top ranked player in each category could be a great play or be a dud tonight. Going all in on any player probably isn't a great move.

With DFS, I try to think of these things:

• Who makes the most sense to play?

• Where is the field leaning?

• Who has been the most consistent?

• Who has the most upside?

• Who will benefit me most if others are wrong?

Bottom of the Barrel

Some people call these "value" plays or "salary savers." I hate both terms. These are players that I like for tonight that fit at the lowest salary tier. It could be they're playing on one of the top forward lines or it could be that they've been playing well, but these are my cheap calls for a skater to pick up a goal or assist.

Adam Gaudette: VAN - C (DK: $3.2K, FD: $3.8K)

Clayton Keller: ARI - W (DK: $4.4K, FD: $5.6K)

Keith Yandle: FLA - D (DK: $4.5K, FD: $5.8K)

Line Stacks

Line stacking is a common strategy in GPP. You’ll see a lot of winning lineups where players are stacked from the same forward lines or power play lines. DraftKings allows a maximum of 6 skaters from the same team (with skaters from at least 3 teams) and FanDuel allows a maximum of 4 skaters from one team. In tournaments, you'll often see 3-3 stacks (meaning 3 players from one team and 3 from another team), 4-3, and 3-3-2 stacks.

Looking at stacks for tonight, here are LineStar's top projected owned stacks, my top ranked, and the "risk it for the biscuit" stacks (high-upside, low ownership stacks.

Keep in mind, these are my favorites. These lines may change so keep an eye out for news during the day and during pre-game warmups. You should all do your own research and you might (and probably should) disagree with me in some spots. Don't be afraid to go your own way.

Good luck today! Tag me in the LineStar Chat @ZeroInDenver if you have any questions or feedback. Follow me on Twitter @ZeroInDenver.

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