NHL Hockey Betting: Montreal Canadiens at Detroit Red Wings
We’ll pass on the short card for Wednesday and look ahead to Thursday’s 11 game schedule. In this preview we’ll look at an ‘original six’ matchup between the Montreal Canadiens and Detroit Red Wings. The Canadiens have had nothing but bad luck this year losing Carey Price to a season ending injury and more recently losing defenseman/emotional leader P.K. Subban. They’ve got a ton of other injuries up and down the roster as well. To their credit, however, the Habs haven’t quit–they’re 4-6-0 in their last ten games which isn’t bad given the length of their injury list. They’re coming off a very impressive 4-3 home win over the rugged Anaheim Ducks on Tuesday night. The Canadiens won’t make the playoffs–that looked like a foregone conclusion after their torrid start–but they’re playing with pride and could jump over Ottawa, Carolina and New Jersey to finish as high as 9th in the East. That might not sound like much but given everything that’s happened to this team this season that would be an accomplishment.
The Detroit Red Wings are still alive for the playoffs but they need to quickly reverse their current form. The Wings have lost 6 of 10 and were ripped by the Tampa Bay Lightning on Tuesday night. They’re tied for the final wild card spot in the Eastern Conference but they’ve got to deal with the red hot Philadelphia Flyers who own the tiebreaker. Philly looked awful for most of the season but they found the groove about a month ago and have been on a scorching hot run. They enter Thursday’s action with a 6-2-2 record in their last ten games.
The Canadiens are what they are–a proud team trying to play hard down the stretch despite injuries throughout the roster. Not sure about the Red Wings. Statistically, they’re not a playoff team. They have a mediocre defense and penalty kill (ranking #16 in goals against per game and on the kill). They’re #23 in goals per game (2.3 per) and #20 on the power play. At any rate, they’re not good enough to justify this price. With Ben Scrivens in net for the Habs we’ll take the big underdog price.
BET MONTREAL CANADIENS +180 OVER DETROIT RED WINGS
