The NHL playoffs get going Saturday early evening from Carolina, with the Hurricanes hosting the New York Islanders. I'm happy to see this as the first game of our weekend, because it's one I've been most drawn toward since I began compiling numbers for the eight matchups we have in store.
I'm expecting plenty of Hurricanes shots this series. They averaged north of 40 shots per game in four meetings with New York this year, and are averaging about 36 per game as a team on home ice over the past month and a half.
The Islanders are also particularly vulnerable to shots from the wing, allowing the fifth-most per game across the last 10 games, which coincides nicely with the four players who looked the best to me.
I'm seeing four targets I like best, allow me to briefly touch on why.
The play is thus loading up Guentzel, Necas and Svechnikov at 3+, and Teravainen at 2+, as shown below.
Note: FanDuel only includes regulation shots in the playoffs due to the presence of full-OT periods and as many overtimes as it takes for a winner to be decided. If you'd like to sacrifice some odds for the inclusion of OT shots, ESPN has this at +685.
Just to be safe, I'm also spreading a quarter unit on each of these guys up at one number higher, just in case I'm too right for my own good. Better safe than sorry!
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