NHL

3 Daily Fantasy Hockey Stacks for 2/2/21

In daily fantasy hockey, stacking is a key strategy in tournaments. We want to correlate our lineups with up to four players to maximize our upside, as if one player on a line is scoring goals, it's likely that his linemates are getting assists as well. Ideally, we'll want players that will get a lot of ice time together on an even strength line and a power play line. Two good resources for line combinations are LeftWingLock.com and DailyFaceoff.com, so be sure to check those sites for up to date line information.

Tuesday is always a big day in NHL DFS, and we've got eight games on the slate tonight. Which teams do we want to stack for a chance to win a tournament? Let's take a look.

Edmonton Oilers

If you watched the Edmonton Oilers play over the weekend, you probably wanted to stack them. They won 4-3 on Saturday and then erupted for eight goals in a win on Sunday.

The stars you would expect to have big games in these high-scoring efforts did, as Connor McDavid ($9,000) and Leon Draisaitl ($8,700) had eight real-world points apiece in those two games. These two are now sitting atop the NHL scoring leaderboard, and no player in the league is within seven points of them. At this point, it makes sense to just play them together in a stack, because even if they aren't always on the same five-on-five line, they do get some time together depending on the game flow. They, of course, are lethal on the power play, being first and second on the man advantage.

Ryan Nugent-Hopkins ($7,500) added three points and seven shots of his own over the past two and is the next most important piece of this stack -- which is one that will be very popular today.

The Oilers face the same Ottawa Senators team that they went nuclear against on Sunday. Ottawa is the worst defensive team in the league, allowing a staggering 4.89 goals per game. They played the last game without top defenseman Thomas Chabot, leaving an already weak blueline group bereft of talent. The Oilers went four for five on the power play in the game on Sunday, going up against a penalty kill that has a success rate of just 68%.

That makes Tyson Barrie ($4,800) a good play as the power-play quarterback, as he was restored to the role on Saturday and scored two points in each of the two games on the weekend. If Chabot were to miss this game, it could be another long night for Ottawa.

The Oilers' implied team total is up to 3.83, the highest on tonight's slate. When the Oilers score a lot of goals, we typically know where they are coming from, so we want those stars stacked in our lineups tonight.

Carolina Hurricanes

The Carolina Hurricanes are off to a good start this season, with a 5-1-0 record after some of their games got postponed due to COVID. They just beat the Dallas Stars two times this past weekend and look to carry that into the next game.

Third-year player Andrei Svechnikov ($7,000) seems to keep getting better, as he has four goals in the first six games of the season. He's back playing on the top line after starting the season lower down in the lineup. That lets him link up with Sebastian Aho ($7,600), who leads the team with five assists. He has just one goal on the season, but we know Aho can score after he potted 38 goals last year. There is optimism that the Hurricanes will get back Teuvo Teravainen ($5,900) to form a fully operational first line, and Teravainen is a nice value at his salary. His return could hardly come in a better matchup.

Carolina will face off against the Chicago Blackhawks as big -178 moneyline favorites. Chicago has cleaned up their defensive game a bit from what we saw at the start of the season, when they were allowing five goals a night, but it's still not great. They surrender the third most shots on goal per game. That's not good for them against the Hurricanes, who are second in the league in shots per game.

This means you can also consider Dougie Hamilton ($5,400) in your stacks, as he was the defenseman who attempted shots at the highest rate last season, according to Natural Stat Trick. He's also on the top power play and is a bargain for his salary.

When the Hurricanes are on their game, they dominate the shot count, and that could be the case tonight. It makes their floor very high, and with the matchup against Chicago, there is certainly a ceiling, too.

Los Angeles Kings

Prior to this season, the Los Angeles Kings weren't likely to get into the stacks article many times this season. However, they shouldn't be ignored tonight, but they likely will be.

They've averaged a respectable 3.13 goals per game to start the season. Anze Kopitar ($7,300) is in the top 10 in scoring with 12 points. His salary is a bit challenging when you compare it to other players around him, but that should keep his popularity down. His wingers are good options for salary relief, as both Adrian Kempe ($4,400) and Alex Iafallo ($4,600) are affordable and play on the power play with Kopitar. Each has five points in eight games.

The real enticing aspect of stacking the Kings is the matchup. The Kings take on their Southern California rivals in the Anaheim Ducks. The Ducks are off to a horrible start defensively. They are allowing the most shot attempts against and the most high danger chances against per 60 minutes. Their overall goals against numbers look decent because of the play of John Gibson, but he came back to earth over the weekend, recording two games with negative FanDuel points. If Gibson doesn't bail out the Ducks, they could be in trouble with how bad their defense has been.

Los Angeles might not be a comfortable stack, but all fantasy managers will feel the same way. With the average cost of the stack being fairly low, they can fit in nicely with a more expensive stack for lineups with a lot of correlation.


Nicholas Vazquez is not a FanDuel employee. In addition to providing DFS gameplay advice, Nicholas Vazquez also participates in DFS contests on FanDuel using his personal account, username hbyanksman. While the strategies and player selections recommended in his articles are his/her personal views, he/she may deploy different strategies and player selections when entering contests with his/her personal account. The views expressed in his/her articles are the author’s alone and do not necessarily reflect the views of FanDuel.