NHL Betting Odds: New Jersey Devils at Atlanta Thrashers

Added on Mar 11, 2011 by Jack Thurman in

NHL

The improbable late season surge of the New Jersey Devils looks to continue on Friday night as they travel to Phillips Arena for a game against the Atlanta Thrashers. New Jersey’s in-season turnaround based on fierce defense has been downright astounding. The Thrashers, meanwhile, continue to be one of the more underachieving teams in the NHL.

New Jersey Devils at Atlanta Thrashers
March 11, 2011 4:35 PM Pacific

The Devils are coming off a rare loss, dropping their last game to Ottawa 2-1 at home. That’s hardly a reason to get off of the New Jersey gravy train–New Jersey has been winning with defense and hard work and they’re going to come up short now and then. The Devils are still 8-2 in their last 10 games and Ottawa has been getting excellent goaltending from Craig Andersson. A one goal loss to a hot goaltender is nothing to be ashamed of. New Jersey will come into this game well rested having last played on Tuesday night and we don’t expect a team with their tenacity to take a loss lightly. As we noted in the introduction, what the Devils have done in the second half of the season has been astounding. They’ve won 11 of their last 13 and are 14-3-1 in their last 18 games. They’ve won 18 of their last 23 with only 3 losses in regulation. The Devils still aren’t scoring a lot of goals, but have been playing incredible defense and generally out working their opponents night after night. They’ve only allowed more than 3 goals once in their last 24 games and have allowed a total of 38 in that stretch.

New Jersey has dominated the Thrashers in head to head play in recent years winning 7 of the last 10 meetings including 4 of the last 5 at Phillips Arena. The last time the Devils played in this building the then red hot Thrashers embarrassed them 7-1. That’s very unlikely to happen again. We’ll back New Jersey as small road favorites against Atlanta’s #28 scoring defense and look for the game to go Under the total. Thrashers not scoring a lot of goals lately and have gone Under in 7 of their last 10 games and 3 of the last 4 head to head have gone Under. Devils have gone Over only twice in their last 21 games (14 UN, 5 push).

Bet New Jersey Devils -135 over Atlanta Thrashers
Bet New Jersey/Atlanta Under 5 -110