NHL Betting Free Picks: Chicago @ Edmonton
Added on Jan 26, 2010 by Jack Thurman in
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The Chicago Blackhawks are off of one of their worst losses of the year, a 5-1 setback at Vancouver, and have dropped four points behind San Jose for the Western Conference lead. The good news is that they’ll head to Edmonton tonight for a game against the lowly Oilers and it provides us with a nice NHL betting opportunity to cash in at our favorite sportsbook. Oilers are not only the worst team in the West, but the worst team in the NHL with only 38 points and the Blackhawks should have a field day against them:
Chicago Blackhawks vs. Edmonton Oilers
January 26, 6:35 PM Pacific
Blackhawks only 1-2 on their most recent road trip and will want to close the gap with San Jose before their Thursday night battle. Chicago ran into a hot Roberto Luongo against Vancouver on Saturday night, scoring one goal despite 44 shots on the Canucks’ goaltender. For that reason, their one goal is sort of misleading in terms of their overall offensive performance against the Canucks–they were getting plenty of shots on net, but were getting stoned by Luongo.
Edmonton is just a bad team, having lost 10 straight games. The Oilers are next to last in goals against per game, fractionally better than cellar dwelling Toronto. That’s bad news since Chicago is 4th in goals scored per game and 2nd in shots on goal per game. Despite the qualitative superiority of the Blackhawks over the Oilers its never a good idea to lay big chalk prices on the road in the NHL. So we’re going to play this game Over the total. Chicago is Over in 3 of their last 5, while the Oilers are Over in 6 of their last 8. If the Blackhawks dial down their effort slightly with the big game against the Sharks on deck that’ll manifest itself most significantly on the defensive end which will give the Oilers more scoring chances. Four of the last five head to head have gone Over with an average of 7.4 goals per game. Both YTD meetings have gone Over, with 7 goals scored in each. Look for a similar result tonight.
Bet Chicago/Edmonton Over 5′ -130
