Top NHL Betting Picks For Tuesday, November 23rd (2021)
Welcome back to our regularly scheduled Tuesday edition of NHL best bets. Last week was a split card, as we nailed the Hurricanes on the road in Vegas on the money line. Carolina came out of the locker room flying and jumped out to an early 2-0 lead on the road, squandered it in the second period, but regrouped in the final stanza to secure a 4-2 win and a cashed ticket for us.
Unfortunately, the Sabres vs. Penguins game did not go as planned. We took the over at six goals around even money, and some played over 5.5 at around -135. Regardless of which line you played, the over did not cash despite getting exactly the game script we wanted. Both teams combined for nearly 70 shots on net, but only three went in. Now, it’s time to bounce back.
Tonight is a very limited slate of games on the ice; just three games are scheduled as the league prepares to load up on pre and post-Thanksgiving matchups. There isn’t much value on the board tonight either, and since I don’t want to force bets I’m not in love with, I’ve got one unit split across two wagers in the same game. Let’s turn some profit.
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Calgary Flames 60-Minute Line (0.75u, -115); Puck Line -1.5 (0.25u, +145)
Perhaps no NHL team in recent years had ridden the “new coach wave†quite as hard as the Chicago Blackhawks. Since the organization fired Jeremy Colliton on November 6th, the Hawks have ripped off five wins in six games; the only loss understandably coming in Edmonton against the loaded Oilers. Their road trip is coming to a close, however, and so too will their hot streak.
Let’s take a closer look at Chicago’s recent schedule; here’s who they’ve beaten: Nashville, Pittsburgh, Arizona, Seattle. The best team of the bunch is the Predators, who if the season ended today would be the first team out of the Western Conference playoffs. Pittsburgh is fifth from last in the East, and the Kraken and Coyotes are the two worst teams in the NHL in terms of both points and points percentage. Simply put – the Blackhawks haven’t exactly been beating the cream of the crop. In fact, their only meeting with a good team was a 5-2 loss to Edmonton. Enter the red-hot, no pun intended, Calgary Flames.
The Flames are tied for the third-most points in the league, and they’ve climbed the standings in two really unconventional ways. Firstly, they’ve beat the daylights out of the Eastern Conference. Calgary is 11-1-2 against cross-conference opponents, winning nine of the 11 games by three or more goals. They’ve also been road warriors, already playing 13 of their 19 tilts away from the Saddledome and posting a 9-2-2 record in the process. They just returned from a seven-game road trip out east playing mostly strong competition like Toronto, Philadelphia, the Islanders, and Boston, so a return home will be welcomed, especially against a really exploitable team like Chicago.
Calgary is simply a bad matchup for a team like Chicago because the Flames fill the net and the Blackhawks have trouble keeping the puck out of theirs. The Flames are eighth in goals per game while the Blackhawks are sixth-worst in goals against. We may also see Kevin Lankinen for Chicago as Marc-Andre Fleury has started eight of the last 10, and the Blackhawks could see an opportunity to give their 36-year-old netminder extended rest as they won’t play again until Friday. Lankinen would be bad for Chicago, but great for Calgary and us. He’s fourth-worst of all qualified goaltenders in goals saved above expectation (-8.3), so he’s actually allowed a touch over eight goals that should have been stopped.
This Flames team that ranks first in scoring changes and scoring chance conversion, seventh in expected goals for, and ninth in high-danger chances is going to take full advantage of a Blackhawks back end that ranks in the bottom-five of all four of those categories, including dead-last in expected goals and scoring chances allowed.
I also expect Chicago to be road weary – they’re wrapping up a western Canadian (plus Seattle) road trip that packed four games into just six nights. Calgary, on the other hand, should be refreshed as they return home for a full week without any travel. I like the Flames to wrap this one up in regulation, and they should also be able to finish off the Hawks by multiple goals – they’ve won all but one of their games by more than a goal. Play the regulation line down to -125 and the puck line down to +135.
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Mike Wagenman is a featured writer at BettingPros. For more from Mike, check out his archive and follow him on Twitter @mjwags23.