It's a typical Wednesday for the NHL, with only a few games on the schedule but a couple of them getting national shine. We have four total contests on the docket, with the first starting at 7:30 p.m. ET. Here are my NHL DFS lineup recommendations to try and help you out.
SLATE PREVIEW
No team is on the second leg of a back-to-back. Two teams are on the first leg, but the goaltending situations don't lead to any concern for me about who starts Wednesday. That wasn't my expectation before the season with the Panthers, but here we are.
GOALIES
Darcy Kuemper, LOS at SEA ($8,000): Kuemper was fantastic for the Kings last season, and while he hasn't been on quite the same level, Kings fans are surely happy with his performance. The veteran journeyman has a 2.23 GAA and .914 save percentage through 21 appearances. Meanwhile, it turns out the Kraken are the team best positioned to end up the worst offense in the NHL this year. Seattle is now down in the bottom two in both goals and shots on net per game.
Spencer Knight, CHI vs. NYR ($7,300): Knight's last start was bad, but it was his third start in five days, all on the road. Now he's back at home, and he still has a .914 save percentage on the season. The Rangers have played 31 games now, and as such their 2.65 goals and 26.4 shots on net per game don't feel like flukes. They feel like signs of a bottom-10 offense.
VALUE PLAY/ONE-OFF
Nazem Kadri, CGY vs. DET ($6,200): With a goal and two assists in his last game, Kadri has 26 points in 31 contests. All that, and he still only has a 5.9 shooting percentage on the season. The Red Wings did just pitch a shutout, but it was against the lowly Canucks. Detroit still has a 3.33 GAA on the campaign.
FORWARD LINE STACK TO CONSIDER
Mammoth vs. Panthers
Nick Schmaltz (C - $5,400), Clayton Keller (W - $6,100), JJ Peterka (W - $4,900)
Logan Cooley is, unfortunately, hurt, but the Mammoth have enough talent to be able to still have a strong first line. All three of these guys also play on the top power-play unit. The Panthers have a below-average penalty kill, but they are also dealing with an ebb from Sergei Bobrovsky at the moment. Over his last seven games he has a 3.65 GAA and .860 save percentage.
Schmaltz is fairly streaky but he has four points in his last four games. His ice time has picked back up in the two games Cooley has missed, and he has five shots on net and five blocked shots in those contests. Keller started the season slow by his standards but he's fully caught back up. He has 14 points in his last 16 games, five of them on the power play. Keller also still only has an 11.1 shooting percentage on the year, and over the prior four seasons he posted a 15.1 shooting percentage. Peterka's role now that he is a Mammoth and not a Sabre has been a bit up-and-down, but this is a good place to be. He has 12 goals and 11 assists in 31 games, and that is with only one power-play point. Peterka played 5:00 on the power play in his last game. That changes his upside.
DEFENSEMEN
Rasmus Andersson, CGY vs. DET ($5,400): Let us not focus on what a disaster MacKenzie Weegar has been this season and instead focus on how good Andersson has been. Over his last 14 games, Andersson has 16 points and a whopping 36 shots on net. The Red Wings, as previously noted, have a 3.33 GAA, which is bottom 10 in the NHL.
Brandt Clarke, LOS at SEA ($4,000): Over his last seven outings Clarke has tallied five points and 17 shots on net. Also, the Kings have been shuffling around the power-play units recently, but for now Clarke is on the top unit. I am hoping that remains true, because a big reason why I like him in this matchup is that the Kraken have the league's worst penalty kill.
