Colorado’s Valeri Nichushkin had his eight-game goal streak ended in Game three that he looks to restart as the Avalanche look to rebound on offense
Monday has two games on the slate that should excite with the Hurricanes looking to keep their Stanley Cup hopes alive as they travel to the Big Apple to take on the Rangers while the Avalanche look to tie things up with the Stars on home ice.
It should be another exciting night of playoff action that we look to profit from as we've been red hot with a 12-4 record over our last 16 picks with a 5-2 record for our picks in the Hurricanes and Rangers series.
All betting lines are from BetMGM and are subject to change. Hockey is a difficult sport to predict so please gamble responsibly.
Bet: Hurricanes ML (-110), Seth Jarvis anytime goal (+240), Rangers Under 2.5 goals (+105)
The Hurricanes finally ended the Rangers seven-game winning streak with their Game four win and look to keep the wins coming as they head back out on the road. The Rangers have yet to lose a playoff home game with netminder Igor Shesterkin repping .922 save percentage and a 2.24 goals against average in four wins. He will make things difficult for a Hurricanes team that is just 1-3 on the road this playoffs after entering the postseason with 7-2-1 record over their last 10 regular season road games.
Carolina will need to find their defensive game as their offense has been keeping them afloat in this series. The Rangers have scored three or more goals in every playoff game they’ve played and will need to be slowed down at a certain point. If the Hurricanes can get a competent game out of netminder Frederik Anderson and their defensive unit, they should stay alive.
They are also due for big games out of forwards Seth Jarvis, Martin Necas and Evgeny Kuznetsov, who all have just one point in the second round. Jarvis seems like the most likely case for a bounce back game after he dominated in the first round versus the Islanders with a team-leading four goals and eight points.
He’s been getting the chances as he’s landed three shots in three of the four games this series and should breakthrough for a clutch goal that helps his team extend the series to Game six.
Bet: Avalanche ML (-135), Valeri Nichushkin anytime goal (+160)
The Stars shocked the Avalanche for a clutch Game three win on the road thanks to stellar play from netminder Jake Oettinger, who stole the game with 28-save performance where he saw significant pressure from the home team for most of the game.Colorado will look to respond as it's very usual for them to be limited to just one goal on home ice as it happened just once in the regular season when they lost 2-1 to Montreal.
They will surely wake up on offense as their one goal effort barely lowered their goals per home game average that now sits at four so far this postseason. It was also the first time in nine games that winger Valeri Nichushkin didn't find the scoresheet and ended his lengthy eight-game goal streak.
He should find his game once again and score his playoff-leading tenth goal after dropping to the second line with Casey Mittelstadt and Zach Parise but still resides on the top powerplay unit that was only deployed once in Game four.
The Avalanche lost just nine of their 41 home games during the regular season and lost back-to-back home games three times. The loss at home was their second in a row to the Stars as they lost 7-4 in early March but was Dallas' first win in Ball Arena in their last four matchups.