NHL Hockey Best Bets for March 3, 2016
Busy day in the NHL for Thursday with twelve games on the board. Here are our best bets:
NEW YORK RANGERS AT PITTSBURGH PENGUINS:
Battle of Eastern Conference teams that started the season in poor form but have come on strongly since the start of 2016. The Rangers turnaround happened a month or so before Pittsburgh and that’s why New York has a more secure playoff standing at the moment. The Rangers are in second place in the Metropolitan Division with 80 points though it’s almost unfathomable that they’ll run down the top team. That would be the Washington Capitals who lead them by 18 points. For that reason, second place ain’t bad for the Broadway Blueshirts. Pittsburgh is currently slotted in the final wild card spot three points ahead of the Philadelphia Flyers, four points ahead of the Carolina Hurricanes and five points ahead of the New Jersey Devils and Ottawa Senators. In other words, they’ve got a huge pack of teams close behind them which increases their pressure to win and win often. They’re just three points back of Detroit and the top wild card spot as well as three points behind the New York Islanders for the #3 spot and the Metro Division and the playoff spot that comes with it though right now the Isles have the tiebreaker advantage.
The Rangers are in a situation which I’d have circled in big red ink in most years but this year I’m not sure how its going to play out. New York plays at Washington on Thursday night and the $64,000 question is ‘How important is it for the Rangers to beat the mighty Capitals?’. Scenario One: This is the Rangers’ chance to show that they’re just as good as the Capitals but got some bad breaks early in the season. A national TV audience in the US and Canada will be watching and winning this ‘statement game’ will help the team build confidence going into the playoffs. Scenario Two: The Rangers game is just another game on the schedule and with New York so far ahead of everyone provides no intrinsic motivation for New York. In Scenario One, this becomes the mother of all lookahead spots tonight. In Scenario Two, it doesn’t.
Ultimately, I’m going to play the Rangers based on value alone. These teams are pretty evenly matched and in a ‘coin flip’ game the plus money is the play.
BET NEW YORK RANGERS +135 OVER PITTSBURGH PENGUINS
EDMONTON OILERS AT PHILADELPHIA FLYERS:
Connor McDavid is the truth. When #97 returned from his shoulder injury I cautioned Oilers’ fans that it might take him a while to get his game back. It took him about a half hour–at 10:02 of the second period of his first game back in action he scored what might be his most spectacular goal of the season. In the process, he displays so many next level skills that you have to slow it down and analyze it like the Zapruder film to see them all. In 16 games since his return he’s scored 7 goals and added 18 assists for 25 points. That’s *real* good.
The most impressive thing about McDavid might be his personality and leadership qualities. We’re at the point now where any athlete that didn’t get convicted of a felony or get into a fistfight with his college teammates is praised for ‘maturity and leadership skills’. Some players enter the pros without much expected of them in terms of leadership and surprise–eg: Cam Newton who didn’t seem like anything special as a leader in college but has become one of the best in the NFL. Connor had a lot expected of him and he’s not only met those expectations he’s exceeded them.
A lot of players have the quality of making teammates look better with their talent. McDavid has the rare quality of giving his teammates–guys not even on the same line–more confidence just by being in the lineup. His leadership is legit–in his interviews he’s gone out of his way to downplay the fact that he might be the most talented first year hockey player ever and instead focuses on his teammates and the wins and losses. Watching him play you get the sense that he means it. The fact that he has nearly three times as many assists as he has goals sure doesn’t typify him as a guy who cares much about his stats. There have been calls from a number of hockey journalists–myself included–for the Oilers to go ahead and put the ‘C’ on McDavid’s uniform. My original thinking was that if McDavid was as legit as we were told the Oilers should make him captain in a year or two. I had him seriously underestimated–he’s already the leader of the team and he leads by example. He’s earned the right to be captain.
And lest we forget, this guy is just barely 19 years old. When I was 19 I thought I had ‘overachieved’ when I was able to steal a handful of beef jerky from 7-11. There’s going to be some good value on the Oilers as the season winds down. You know McDavid isn’t going to let his teammates quit. You sure as hell know he’s not going to quit. And with Edmonton management making some deadline trades to set an ‘example’ they’ve demonstrated to the rest of the players that they’ve got a choice. They can play on the same team with a future Hall of Famer, or they can watch it happen from somewhere like Columbus or Buffalo.
BET EDMONTON OILERS +145 OVER PHILADELPHIA FLYERS