Friday Oct 17th NHL DFS Slate Breakdown

I got two goals from Chandler Stephenson. Yeah, my Thursday was pretty nice. I got boatraced in NFL and even lost a DK Metcalf 50% rec yds boost after beating the closing line by five yards and having him get 80% of the way there after one drive, but it was a positive day all the same thanks to a good CS slate and a Chandler Stephenson-fueled 2x in the DK streets.

I may be a mad man, but I am your mad man. A 2v2 of Eichel-Stone vs. Fiala-Kempe is worth 5 figures, which is unfortunate considering lines in LA did not turn out as I had hoped (Danault sliding up to L1, Turcotte filling his place) and I stubbornly stuck with the PP stack. I even had the $100 to go from Brandt Clarke up to a one-off Gostisbehere, who somehow came in sub-10%. Did I expect him and Nikishin to truly be the Canes’ third pair defenders in a competitive game vs. Anaheim? Well…

Please make sure you check out Tuesday’s $100k to first contest recap, including a friend of the newsletter who took second for $40k!

Let’s dive in to Friday’s DraftKings slate, as the pre-NBA lobby remains juiced with $25k to first in the $444 and $20k in the $5. If you haven’t run hot enough yet (and no, Chandler Stephenson turning 22 minutes of hockey into actual fantasy points doesn’t constitute a hot streak.. I hope that continues however...), there’s still a few days to do so before the NBA returns to steal our lobby away.

Underdog Fantasy also has a couple nice contests, with a $25 with $500 to first and $7 with $2k to first. This four-game slate locks at 7:00PM EST with two games at 7, another at 8:30, then closes out with Utah hosting San Jose at 9PM.

Reminder that all of the below information is as-of Thursday (or earlier) practices, and we could get updated news during AM skates. Vancouver is on a back-to-back, so I will use Thursday’s game to inform their setup.

I will return the rainbow sheet in some form next week, as an FYI. I am not going to focus much, if at all, on to-date trends among these teams.

All stats from naturalstattrick.com unless otherwise noted.

Odds and Totals from DK Sportsbook

Tampa (-155) @ Detroit (+130) ||| o6.5 +105

Tampa has struggled out of the gates, sitting at 1-2-1 and getting clobbered in basically all four games, with their only win seeing them nearly blow a 3-0 and 4-1 lead to Boston. Nikita Kucherov has especially struggled, getting outscored 6-1 and outshot 36-24 in his 5v5 minutes. The two-time reigning Art Ross Trophy recipient for Points leader of the NHL has only three points in four games, an output identical to that of Eric Robinson and Tanner Pearson.

You certainly do expect Kucherov to figure it out at some point, but Detroit has recovered admirably from their 5-1 shellacking at the hands of Montreal in their home opener, picking up three straight wins against Toronto x2 and Florida that included elite goaltending from Cam Talbot. Tampa is offered some reprieve by the confirmed John Gibson, though with a back-to-back to worry about in Columbus on Saturday, it’s likely Jonas Johansson gets one of the games this weekend.

Kucherov is lining up with Brandon Hagel and Brayden Point, with Guentzel sliding down to Anthony Cirelli’s line. Gage Goncalves is the final member of the top six, and at $2600 is quite cheap for a guy with some PP time to go with the role. His TOI is pretty low, ranging between 11-15 minutes in the four games to-date, but they’ve yet to show a serious effort to mix in Oliver Bjorkstrand in the top six despite the PP1 role holding steady, so Goncalves’ role seems relatively safe. TB2 is $7500 cheaper than TB1, and I don’t think there’s one Matt Boldy separating these line stacks, so I lightly prefer TB2 in this spot.

Defensively, Victor Hedman remains the head of this blue line and is averaging 24:50 per night, but the roles for Moser and McDonagh (and possibly Cernak) appear solid enough to warrant their price tags in the low $3k range on DraftKings. One minor thing I noted before Tuesday’s game: in the early going, TB2 is tightly correlated to the McDonagh-Cernak pairing at 5v5. Even last game, played with 5 D for most of the night after Crozier’s injury, this trend held. While Hedman is hard to fit with his correlated TB1 friends, it’s not the craziest idea to spend up for several studs and use something like Goncalves-McDonagh and hope, or even a Cirelli at $4200.

I’m personally not likely to wind up on Tampa, but with just four games they have to be at least in consideration.

MOODS’ DUDES: Nikita Kucherov ($7900), Oliver Bjorkstrand ($3900), Gage Goncalves ($2600)

The Red Wings might get Lucas Raymond back from a one-game absence, but I am assuming at the moment he is out based on his practice status. He skated with Larkin-Appleton if he does return, but didn’t spend the full practice with that line and I suspect they’ll play it safe.

Even if Raymond does play, it’s Marco Kasper’s world and we are all just living in it. DET2 has a substantially better xGF% than DET1 despite being outscored 4-2 (Larkin is up 3-0 at 5v5). Alex DeBrincat is the most fantasy-relevant dude on this team based on last year’s stats, and this year he is right back at it again, through four games tallying 8 shot attempts per game and leading the slate in expected fantasy points in the early going (yes, including Kaprizov and Boldy, who are 2 and 3 right on his tail). Any concern that Marco Kasper was not here to stay can be set aside, and I feel that before long he’ll have a true #1 role on this team. With Patrick Kane blocking his true ascendance to PP1 for the moment, however, it may not be this season. Kane is a fine stacking mate, but DeBrincat is a clear priority, and the W slate is loaded, so I prefer Cat, then Kasper, then Larkin among Detroit forwards, with Cat-Kasper also holding significant UD battle royale appeal since Kasper’s UD accrual rate (factoring in hits) is very good.

Defensively, Mo Seider has only six blocks in four games, which is not what we’re looking for with his somewhat limited offensive output. Rolling a clear third pair, however, indicates that they are serious about this Edvinsson - Axel Sandin-Pellikka pairing, and they’ve rewarded the faith with solid underlyings despite a 3-0 scoreboard deficit. The price now matches the minutes, however, making the entire DET blue-line a secondary consideration for DFS and betting purposes.

It’s very early, but the way Detroit has played (and the way the top six fared under Todd McLellan last season) has me thinking they could be in the mix all season long.

MOODS’ DUDES: Dylan Larkin ($6800), Alex DeBrincat ($6700), Marco Kasper ($4300)

Minnesota (+105) @ Washington (-125) ||| o5.5 -125

Minnesota is 2-2 and during the run of play is down 15-14 (with a shootout win “goal” added to their tally, officially), yet 2025-26 feels like a complete breath of fresh air for a club that has been spanked by Columbus and Dallas already.

Why is that? Zeev Buium.

More generally, the PP1 is actually hitting. The 5v5 goals have been scarce, but a 36% GF% undersells the solid work done at 5v5 with a 50% xGF%. The Minnesota PP1 has a staggering 10 PPG in 30 minutes of PP time so far, over a third of the way to NYI and ANA totals from last year in less than 10% of the time and less than 5% of the season.

The collection of talent seems undeniable, with Matt Boldy officially making The Leap last year to stardom, yet without a true quarterback it felt like the Wild PP was always a step behind the sum of its parts. Buium has been every bit as advertised, with deft touch with the puck on his stick and the head and mobility to know where to be to serve as an outlet for Kaprizov’s artistry. It should come as no surprise that Kaprizov and Boldy account for seven of the goals off their sticks, but with Buium at 5 PP Points and a goal himself, we’re actually getting a fairly relevant fantasy defenseman out of Buium as he is both outshooting and outgenerating shot attempts vs. Tarasenko and JEEK on the PP1. So long as he’s a secondary option, rather than a tertiary one, Buium will come pre-loaded with DFS and betting floor, median, and upside thanks to the dynamic PP1. His 5v5 role has been better than I could have imagined through four games after the way it ended for him in the postseason last year, but an important piece of context to consider is the return of Jonas Brodin after missing games 1 and 2. Based on the last two games and moving forward, I expect Buium to settle in around the 17-18 minute mark even with a monopoly on the PP time, as he’s largely been paired with Bogosian rather than Spurgeon.

With a total lack of 5v5 production as noted, Marco Rossi’s outlook has been steady but not spectacular, earning him 4 points in 4 games and 18-19 minutes a night on average. Should Minnesota turn on the 5v5 switch at some point, the fact that his price has not moved from the start of the season mixed with his now-near-certain top line role with Boldy and Kaprizov makes him a very attractive option, especially against a Washington team that we’re expecting once again to be missing perhaps it’s top defensive forward in Pierre-Luc Dubois (imagine I told you this 13 months ago).

Vladimir Tarasenko and Joel Eriksson Ek round out the interest list, but for a combined $10000 this mini-stack is not speaking to me.

MOODS’ DUDES: Kirill Kaprizov ($8200), Matt Boldy ($7500), Zeev Buium ($4100)

Alex Ovechkin’s role is being limited, but the money minutes are still flowing through Ovi. He’s played 17 of a possible 20 PP minutes, with John Carlson checking in on 2nd in PPTOI at 13:25. Thus, you can add Ovi on to any Washington stack and feel good about it, however for price & matchup reasons (plus the fact that Dylan Strome is $5700!) he’s not a must for me here.

The defensemen have been leading the way, with Ovi’s 25 shot attempts in four games bested only by John Carlson and Jakob Chychrun, tied with 27. Chychrun has been fantastic, specifically, with those shot attempts only leading to 8 on net (a number sure to rise, and identical to Carlson) but also 1 goal and 3 primary assists. Carlson, on the other hand, mixes in 10 blocks to Chychrun’s 1, a separation that is probably overstated but still likely directionally accurate. Washington puts a lot of their offense on the shoulders of these two, and I believe they are both capable. The roles are unimpeachable and the price tags remain quite fair. Like Ovi, you can add either one on to just about any Washington stack, but the difference for me is that both are clear DFS and betting targets tonight against a MIN team that historically funnels shot attempts to opposing blueliners:

Tom Wilson for $5600 serves as the true engine of the forward group in a post-Ovi era, featuring PP and PK duties to go with a sizable 5v5 role. His rates are just fine, and paired with a still-too-cheap Connor McMichael (though Nic Dowd’s role grew much more with no PLD despite him not getting tasked in a matchup role with Kucherov, a job I once again see getting put at the feet of McMichael-Wilson-Protas) makes for a good DFS stack with the defender of your choice.

Sonny Milano is $2800 and PP1, and taking a longer-picture view of him he profiles as a league-average DKPt generator. You’re relying on a multi-point game from him more than shots or anything, but PP1 jobs that cheap don’t come around often.

MOODS’ DUDES: Tom Wilson ($5600), Jakob Chychrun ($5500), John Carlson ($5100)

Vancouver (-142) @ Chicago (+120) ||| o6.5 +114

Find someone who loves you as much as Dallas loves blowing multi-goal leads to the Vancouver Canucks. After a lackluster first frame, Vancouver came roaring back with four unanswered in the 2nd period and held onto their 4-2 lead in the third, finishing 5-3.

The Canucks are now tasked with traveling to Chicago in what some are saying is the least appetizing 6.5 total game in league history. At least Filip Chytil is on the top line, though Kane-Pettersson-Garland spent a lot of time together (Drew O’Connor was slotted for EP40’s wing pre-game) and could be fairly viewed as the top line.

Evander Kane and Conor Garland flipped PP units, making Garland at $4900 slightly preferable to Evander’s $5300 price, though Elias Pettersson (the good one? can we call him that?) at $6600 has been a fantasy black hole once again, with just four shots, two assists, and zero goals in four games. At least he’s mixed in two blocks bonuses for the Petey believers, though with a bum knee I am not convinced taking a beating in that way is solid strategy.

VAN1 with Chytil is $15400, but it’s worth noting that Quinn Hughes followed EP40 onto the ice last night, rather than Boeser. Given the total and the matchup, I can’t imagine Vancouver goes overlooked on a four-game slate, but my interest level tops out at “sneaky” with these guys. Looks like I’m in for another night of putting my hopes and dreams on a Hawks goalie!

Linus Karlsson is an interesting fantasy profile - he backed up staggeringly good overseas figures with supreme involvement in his half-season in the AHL last year, though hasn’t flashed anything significant, even on a per-minute basis, in limited NHL opportunity. With just 7:44 of TOI last night in his season debut, I find it hard to get there personally, but he could be a pure punt at the minimum in as good as a matchup as he’ll get.

Averaging over three blocks per game in the early going, Tyler Myers is a known commodity on defense with a secure role who comes in at sub-$4k. You’re not going to find a more stylistically different player to Quinn Hughes, but both are good options on this slate at their respective prices.

MOODS’ DUDES: Quinn Hughes ($7400), Conor Garland ($4900), Filip Chytil ($4500)

At long last, we have our first 11F 7D team of the season:

As a quick reminder for anyone new to the Moods Ramblings section of the MSP Discord/zeitgeist, 11F 7D turns any team into the Dallas Stars for fantasy. You pick a player, you pick another player, and you smash them into your lineup. Or you pick one player and play them, undeterred by stacking partners, because who the hell knows when the goals will come and who will be on the ice with your perfect play. The only thing you can’t do is generate a Thomas Harley or Miro Heiskanen, as the above only applies to 11F 7D forwards. The defensemen, as expected, take a hit TOI-wise and thus are hard clicks.

With Chicago, we have a pretty set hierarchy with Connor Bedard sitting atop the food chain. If Chicago eats tonight, I have a good feeling it’ll be with Bedard’s fork and knife. He’ll float around the lineup, playing not just with Dach-Burakovsky but also Nazar, Teuvo, and if Lukas Reichel is going again he’ll be a natural fit on the fourth line as well. 20 minutes is very much in the cards, and the only wart on Bedard is that the attempt rate has been fairly weak, continuing a troubling trend from last year. However, a Vancouver team on a back-to-back profiles as one of the most permissive teams on the board, and I am not ready to give up on Bedard as a reliable rate shooter. I think it’s more of an on-ice squalor thing over the past 50 games or so, more so than it is a change in his behaviors (as even early in his career, his shot rate was better than it has been lately). While no one is mistaking Dach or Burakovsky for an elite playmaker, the plays that Bedard is resorting to making himself also have no clear finisher on the ice, which sucks.

And brings us to Ryan Donato, who down the stretch was Chicago’s most reliable source of offense after Bedard with 9.35 xFPPG and 10.12 actual. In five games, he’s upped his generation to 10.78 xFPPG but failed to convert, with just 6.56 actual on just two points.

It’s a matter of time before Bedard and Donato reunite, but until then both are being severely underutilized as a factor of this offense. The 11F 7D set-up, however, otherwise elevates them back into the conversation for $6300 and $4300, respectively.

Finally, the underutilized award of the century goes to Lukas Reichel, who was Leaping Off The Page electric on Wednesday night in St. Louis, yet couldn’t even unseat Ryan Greene for a PP2 gig. At $2700, with 11F 7D, he’s the sort of guy I would be fine pairing with Bedard and just hoping that something clicked. It’s a small enough slate that you’re not sweating too hard if he posts a 0 and Bedard still gets there, and there’s a small chance for some on-ice overlap. Just 23, Reichel feels like he’s been around forever, but the former 17th overall pick clearly possesses all the tools to be an impact offensive weapon and could get that opportunity with this new coaching staff.

Sam Rinzel and Alex Vlasic are the only defenders I would consider here, but the minutes are capped if Jeff Blashill wants to get all 7 defenders in the mix.

MOODS’ DUDES: Connor Bedard ($6300), Ryan Donato ($4300), Lukas Reichel ($2700)

San Jose (+215) @ Utah (-265) ||| o6.5 +105

San Jose is pretty quickly entering big-time Down Bad Territory, but are also the only team to play only 3 games so far, dropping OT decisions in two. They have been thoroughly dominated in all three games, which is strange considering they had Vegas on the ropes before Ned struck.

Ned also played a bit of a role in the scorebard (he doesn’t see an unscreened shot after not seeing an unscreened pass, and thus just.. falls over? 1980s Gretzky highlights style of goaltending?) against Carolina, but zero shots in the third was the showcase of a team that had flat-lined against a superior opponent.

A shake-up to the lines is in order here, and somehow Macklin Celebrini has even worse linemates now. He’s done nothing to deserve a $7000 price tag, but the linemates in Skinner-Kurashev make that even more glaringly obvious. Eklund-Wennberg-Toffoli at least has the smell of an NHL line, but its price creeps up into a Real Actual NHL Teams range of salary that I am not willing to allocate to the San Jose Sharks.

With the PP units split up across three lines, and Dmitry Orlov taking over for John Klingberg (injured & will not play on Friday), I suppose my interest goes to the cheapest combo, which is Orlov & Will Smith, who at $4500 is centered by Michael Misa, whose only NHL experience is against the Hurricanes. Utah is… not that, and at $3500 I might be tempted to take a swing, as even Collin Graf is a decent player. Misa and Smith both have some PP time, Smith PP1 and Misa PP2, making this a reasonable way to save money.

With Timothy Liljegren also out of the lineup, Sam Dickinson or Shakir Mukhamadullin could be a fun DFS option, but I prefer to just eat my vegetables and play Dmitry Orlov or Mario Ferraro, where the former has the PP1 role and some rates in his recent past, while Mario Ferraro is a walking infirmary blocks bonus for $2900. There are a lot of vacated minutes on this blueline, and the prices don’t reflect the enhanced chances of 3+ blocked shots, all we really need to make the plays worth it even if the offense is hard to come by and unreliable.

MOODS’ DUDES: Will Smith ($4500), Dmitry Orlov ($3400), Mario Ferraro ($2900)

With just two games of a full top-six, it’s hard to overreact, but I fear that Barrett Hayton might be blocking Dylan Guenther from the super-role we want. After 20 and 23 minutes in games 1 and 2, the last two have resulted in 19 and 17 minutes for Guenther and very little exposure to Clayton Keller. The dip in production from Guenther could also be from spending ~half of his PP time in the bumper, allowing Nick Schmaltz to puck-handle in his spot.

Zooming out a bit, the matchup is as good as it gets and a $7800 price tag is actually aggressive enough to make Guenther a decision. And this San Jose squad is so bad that I think I can plug my nose and do it, but Hayton’s $4400 price makes UTA1 $1400 cheaper than UTA2, and UTA1 looks like they’ll get a better role, especially in leading game situations. One of my stronger stances around the league is that I believe Barrett Hayton is a perfect fit for this Utah club and is just as integral as Keller/Guenther/Cooley as currently constructed, so I think his presence specifically elevates his linemates in Keller and Schmaltz here in a way that Cooley-Peterka doesn’t for Guenther.

All that said, Guenther is one of the best fantasy options on the planet, so I am comfortable with him stacked or as a one-off in a cupcake matchup. Logan Cooley is unplayable without Guenther, based on his middling shot rate and lesser involvement with the PP1, but is fine to stack while Keller-Schmaltz-Sergachev are all good options on this slate to complete a PP1 build.

Analyzing games against the Sharks is annoying, because they are so bad that in theory anyone can score on them, and a big lead will just lead to a democratized TOI deployment. With that in mind, UTA3 and UTA4 are $10k and $9k respectively and have 1 PP2 guy each, but I would rather play guys from other teams on this slate if looking to save money.

Nate Schmidt is the final blueliner to consider, as he steps into a 2nd pair, 2nd PP role with no Sean Durzi, and if the kid gloves on Dmitri Simashev are here to stay for the next little while, you could even squint and call Nate Schmidt a top-pair guy based on projected TOI. For $3300, this is an excellent piece to tack on to a UTA stack if punting a D spot anyway. He has no points and 11 blocks + shots on the season, so I am not eager about playing him solo.

MOODS’ DUDES: Dylan Guenther ($7800), Mikhail Sergachev ($6200), Barrett Hayton ($4400)

As always, thanks for reading!

Follow me on X @FakeMoods, and to subscribe to this newsletter. I write ~once a week during the NHL DFS season, previewing DFS slates or reviewing the major contests on DraftKings. You should also subscribe to DJ Mitchell’s YouTube channel, where we stream MSP live (or post right after recording) on Monday and Wednesday nights. I am posting some stuff on my own personal YT channel as well, with a few pre-season Underdog drafts up at the moment and our preseason betting deep dive. And join the Discord (DM me if you want in the MSP Discord), if you somehow haven’t already. The Morning Skate Podcast is on iTunes, Sticher, Spotify, and (probably) any other podcast app of your choosing!