3 Daily Fantasy Hockey Stacks for 8/7/20
When playing NHL DFS -- much like MLB DFS -- stacking is key. Having multiple players from the same team, who correlate together, can give your lineup upside and help you maximize potential points.
You can roster up to four players from the same team in NHL, and you should look to have players from the same forward line or power-play unit together. Shared ice time is the key, as it will maximize their ability to contribute to real-life goals with each other, ultimately leading to more fantasy points for us.
Two of the best resources for that are LeftWingLock.com or DailyFaceOff.com. That is where you can find updated forward and power-play lines for each team.
Let's jump in and look at some stacks to target for goals and plenty of fantasy points.
Edmonton Oilers
The Edmonton Oilers are facing elimination today and need a big offensive performance from their stars.
Sitting with an implied goal total of 3.45, the Oilers lead today's five-game slate and will continue to be a team to target for stacks. Of course, they are led by Connor McDavid ($8,700) and Leon Draisaitl ($8,400), who are on the first and second forward lines, respectively. They are both on the first power-play together -- which has tremendous upside but comes at a very expensive cost. Alongside them on the power-play, we see Ryan Nugent-Hopkins ($7,200) and defender Oscar Klefbom ($5,500).
They make a great four-man stack and should be in a good spot to generate plenty of offense, as the Oilers have held a positive Corsi For (Shot Attempts Created) differential in 5 v 5 situations over the past two games. This shouldn't come as a surprise since the Chicago Blackhawks held a 59.54 Corsi Against (Shot Attempts Allowed) during the regular season, which was the seventh-worst in the league.
Each game in this series has gone for seven goals or more, so approaching this as a game stack is also an option.
Pittsburgh Penguins
It is Sidney Crosby's birthday today, and the best gift he could get would be avoiding elimination to the 12th-seeded Montreal Canadiens.
The Pittsburgh Penguins come in with the second-highest implied goal total on the slate -- 3.09 -- and will need to hit that, and maybe more, to come away with the win. Canadiens' goalie Carey Price has looked elite in this series, but not entirely unbeatable. Crosby ($8,300) has a point in each game so far, along with a total of 11 shots. Evgeni Malkin ($7,700) only has one point, but has 17 shots so far, giving him a solid floor of points each game.
Going to the first power-play for the Penguins provides immense upside but comes at a high cost. Jake Guentzel ($7,300) is on the first forward line with Crosby and comes in with three points and 11 shots as well. The Penguins have held a positive or neutral Corsi For (Shot Attempts Created) differential in 5 v 5 situations in all three games of this series -- it's just a matter of capitalizing on it now.
Nashville Predators
Surprisingly, the Nashville Predators are in a higher-scoring series versus the Arizona Coyotes, and that brings us plenty of fantasy points to capture.
The Predators have scored 8 goals in the first three games of this series and simply need to do more today. They are down 1-2 and facing elimination, so we should expect them to rely on their top offensive players for a boost. Normally, we don't see the Predators correlate their forward lines and their power-play units, but that has changed in this series.
We now see Filip Forsberg ($7,700), Ryan Johansen ($5,200), and Viktor Arvidsson ($5,900) on the first forward line and the first power-play together. This grants them full ice-time correlation, which we rarely saw throughout the regular season. I guess when you are only averaging about 2.5 goals per game, you should consider putting all your best offensive players together -- but what do I know.
