NHL DFS Picks Today: Tage Thompson, Timo Meier, and Stacking the Los Angeles Kings

It is a full day of games this Black Friday but it is a seven-game evening slate on DraftKings and FanDuel where we’re focusing our NHL DFS picks. That keeps players like David Pastrnak, Sidney Crosby, and Alex Ovechkin out of our mix but that also means a more wide-open array of selections to choose from. As it’s the day after a holiday, Stokastic members are strongly encouraged to check our subscriber-only Discord for lineup updates throughout the day.

Let’s get to the NHL DFS picks.

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NHL DFS Picks, Top Stacks, Lineup Optimizer Plays

Center

Roope Hintz (DAL vs. WPG): DraftKings – $5,700 | FanDuel – $8,600

The entire top line for Dallas has been excellent this year with Roope Hintz being no exception. He comes into tonight’s game with 24 points in 19 games, pacing to surpass 100 points on the season. The shooting percentage is high at 20% but this is a guy that shot 16.7% over his prior three seasons and this Stars trio has been very efficient with their scoring for a few years now. It would be nice if he were shooting the puck more, landing just over two on target per contest, but it’s not as if he’s being priced among the super-elite on this slate. The price is very reasonable considering his point production.

Winnipeg is in town tonight and that means the same thing whenever Winnipeg plays: the problem is the goalie. Connor Hellebuyck got shelled in his last start but still has a .928 save percentage on the year and is an all-world goalie. However, Winnipeg’s top line is underwater by expected goal share and that gives Hintz a good skater matchup. Ice time is always a concern with the Stars but again, Hintz isn’t being priced like a 20-minute center. Given the correlation with his line mates, using him in some sort of stack for tournaments makes sense tonight.

For a cheaper option on FanDuel, Mathew Barzal (NYI, $7,100) is fifth among all centers tonight in his fantasy projection despite being 12th in price.

Brock Nelson (NYI at CBJ): DraftKings – $5,600 | FanDuel – $7,800

Going back to the 2021 Bubble season, Brock Nelson has 64 goals in 149 games played, or a 35-goal pace over a full season. He has only improved his goal-scoring skills as he’s matured and so far in this 2022-23 campaign, Nelson is averaging just over 3.1 shots per game. That is a career-best for him, so he is no longer solely reliant on point production for fantasy value. He has a more well-rounded profile and that’s a good thing for DFS players.

It is the matchup with Columbus that is the clear appeal for Nelson tonight. On the year, the Jackets are 27th by expected goals against at 5-on-5 and last by actual goals against. In the two weeks since their defense group got decimated, the numbers have actually been stable, but still bad. Nelson’s line has been very high-event on the season, landing 37 shots per 60 minutes but giving up 38, so they like to trade chances with the opposition, and that’s good for us in DFS. The propensity for shooting, plus top power-play minutes, means that Nelson can be used as a one-off option but is certainly fine in a line stack for tournaments.

Winger

Timo Meier (SJS vs. LAK): DraftKings – $7,900 | FanDuel – $8,200

There has perhaps been no player that has found himself in these pages more often this season than Timo Meier and it’s been for very good reasons. He started the season with zero goals in nine games but was managing over 4.5 shots per game, so the dam was going to break eventually. He turned things around with 11 goals in 11 games so far in November, averaging just over five shots per game. He is not even a point-per-game player on the year but is still one of the most valuable DFS players just because of that shot volume. He has managed the shot bonus on DraftKings in 14/22 games.

Los Angeles has moved Kevin Fiala back to the top line and that experiment did not work well earlier this season. Skating with Anze Kopitar, that line gave up over three expected goals against per 60 minutes at 5-on-5 and over four actual goals against. Meier’s line will see some – not all – of the matchups against that top line and that means a good even-strength matchup for him.

The propensity for high shot volume means that Meier is perfectly acceptable to use by himself in all formats, though the correlation with at least Tomas Hertl means some sort of tournament stack is fine as well.

David Perron (DET vs. ARI): DraftKings – $5,900 | FanDuel – $6,500

It has been four games for David Perron on the top line for Detroit and in those four games, he has six points and 12 shots on goal. It is a small sample against a couple weak teams, but Arizona visiting tonight does not present a difficult matchup. The Coyotes have been fine in November, record-wise, at 4-3-1, but they are giving up the fourth-most expected goals against in the league in that span, being saved by the third-best save percentage. Goaltending cannot save this team every night and it is one reason Perron is listed here.

The other reason is the power play. Perron’s value to a team is largely derived from his PP contributions, as evidenced by their goals this season: the team generates over 20% more shot attempts when Perron is on the top unit than when he’s not, something that extends to last year when Perron was still in St. Louis. Arizona’s penalty kill isn’t bad, on a per-minute basis, but they lead the league in times short-handed per game, so the sheer volume of penalties means this team is on pace to give up nearly 65 PP goals against this season.

With his line-mate correlation, Perron makes the most sense tonight in some sort of tournament stack.

Oliver Bjorkstrand (SEA at VGK): DraftKings – $4,000 | FanDuel – $5,700

Oliver Bjorkstrand’s goal-less streak mercifully came to an end on Wednesday night after he had gone 17 games and 48 shots without a tally. He is still shooting just 3.5% on the season against a three-year average of 12.9% so there is a lot more regression likely to come.

The big issue is that as his goal drought wore on, he was pushed down the lineup. He has skated under 13 minutes in three of his last four games and lost over three minutes of total ice time in November compared to October. His price has fallen, though, so it’s not as if he’s still being priced in the mid-$4,000 range he was a couple weeks ago.

Going into Vegas is a very tough matchup as the Golden Knights’ top-6 forward mix is one of the top forward groups in the league. However, Bjorkstrand and his line mates are most likely to see the bottom-6 from Vegas and the Phil Kessel line, in particular, has not been good this year: 3.8 expected goals against per 60 minutes and a 28.2% expected goal share. Bjorkstrand will see some shifts against them, and his line should get the run of play. He can be used as a one-off tonight for tournament formats.

For a lower-priced option on FanDuel, Tyler Bertuzzi (DET, $4,500) leads 1000 dollar same day loan all our winger projections for guys priced $4,500 or less, and he does so by 33%.

Defense

Jakob Chychrun (ARI at DET): DraftKings – $6,200 | FanDuel – $5,800

Jakob Chychrun showed his fantasy value in his second game since returning from injury, putting up eight shots on goal and adding an assist in the team’s 4-0 win over Carolina. He has 21 shot bonuses on DraftKings over his last 105 regular season contests, or once every five games. For reference, New Jersey’s Dougie Hamilton has one DK shot bonus every 4.6 games over his last three years. Chychrun is not far off from his mark and it’s one reason he’s a very good DFS asset at times.

Tonight, Arizona faces off against a Detroit team allowing the ninth-most shots per 60 minutes at 5-on-5 in the league, so it’s not a bad opportunity for Chychrun to rack up the shots on goal. Our projections have him with a higher fantasy score than both Alex Pietrangelo and Mikhail Sergachev on DraftKings, and both are more expensive than the Coyotes blue liner. On FanDuel, that extends to Miro Heiskanen and Shayne Gostisbehere. He is one of the expensive defense targets for us in tournaments this evening.

Adam Pelech (NYI at CBJ): DraftKings – $3,300 | FanDuel – $4,600

For the same reasons as the aforementioned Nelson, it is a good matchup for Adam Pelech and the Islanders at even strength tonight. Over the last couple weeks, he leads all Islanders blue liners in ice time per game, even if they do spread out the minutes somewhat evenly among five different options. Over the last two seasons, his production per minute at 5-on-5 is in the top-third of defensemen in the league, so he can put up points even without power-play time.

Among all options priced under $3,500 tonight on DK, Pelech is second in expected fantasy production behind another rearguard in this game, Erik Gudbranson of Columbus. There are no issues using Gudbranson instead, but my target goes to the guy whose team is scoring and generating more at 5-on-5.

Goalie

Jake Oettinger (DAL vs. WPG): DraftKings – $7,900 | FanDuel – $8,500

Jake Oettinger has built off two good seasons in the NHL to be even better in 2022-23: a .924 save percentage overall and Evolving Hockey’s Goals Saved Above Expected metric has him fourth in the league. He has failed to reach double-digit DK points in just four out of 14 starts this season, and two of those four were a game he got injured, and his first game back from injury. He has more games this season with at least 20 DK points (6) than he does fewer than 10 (4).

For those reasons, plus a not-so-difficult matchup with Winnipeg, Oettinger is second in our goalie projections for tonight’s slate and is priced much lower than many of the other apparent top options. Despite having just seven games on the docket, there are a half-dozen very good goalies, and Oettinger is at-or-near the top of that list.

Top NHL DFS Stacks Today

BUF1: Skinner-Thompson-Tuch

In over 130 minutes together this season, the top Buffalo line has generated 3.8 expected goals and 4.5 actual goals per 60 minutes at 5-on-5. They have improved on their excellent offensive numbers from a year ago, when they posted 3.3 expected goals and 4.4 actual goals per 60 minutes in nearly 380 minutes together. This is just an excellent offensive trio that skates together at all strengths.

The matchup with New Jersey is a difficult one as the Devils have the lowest expected goals against in the league this season. However, we have seen this line succeed in difficult matchups already as they combined for five points in a game against Pittsburgh, two goals against Vegas, and Tage Thompson even scored against Boston. We have them among the best leveraged lines tonight, so they at least require some attention in tournaments as a lower-owned, high-upside option.

LAK2: Danault-Arvidsson-Moore

After a slow start to the season, perhaps due to a nagging injury from Viktor Arvidsson, the Los Angeles second line has been utterly dominant, generating 3.1 expected goals per 60 minutes at 5-on-5, controlling 66% of the expected goal share over the last month. They are also seeing healthy amounts of ice time, averaging 17-18 minutes a game so far in November. The line is absent a truly elite finisher, so they do have games where they post a lot of shots but fail to score, but the shot generation is what is important for us.

San Jose has also improved after a brutal start to the year but their defensive metrics at 5-on-5 are still just in the middle of the league. With how well this Kings line is playing, and the fact our Top Stacks tool has them around 5% ownership on DK (much higher on FD, though), this Los Angeles trio is one of the mid-priced options to target tonight for large-field tournaments.

*Additional stats from Natural Stat Trick

Michael has been writing about fantasy hockey for over a decade, and has been playing Daily Fantasy for just as long. He has contributed to both the Chicago Tribune and the Boston Herald, has worked for Rogers Sportsnet in Canada and is now in his fifth season with Stokastic. He lives in Fredericton, New Brunswick, Canada, and can be reached on Twitter @SlimCliffy.

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