Blackhawks vs Avalanche Picks: Ride Colorado's Lethal Offense
Blackhawks vs Avalanche Picks: Ride Colorado's Lethal Offense
The Chicago Blackhawks and Colorado Avalanche start their season tonight in Colorado. The Avalanche are looked at as one of the premiere Stanley Cup contenders fresh off a Presidents’ Trophy-winning season, finishing the 56 game season with 82 points.
As for Chicago, well their dynasty days are long over. They went 24-25-7 finishing 21st overall in the league. They were without their captain, Jonathan Toews for the entirety of the season and clearly he was really missed.
But, he will rejoin old friend Patrick Kane and take the ice tonight. So who comes out on top and who should you bet on?
Chicago Blackhawks vs Colorado Avalanche Preview
Unfortunately for the Avalanche, their playoff run was cut short by the Vegas Golden Knights in the second round of the Stanley Cup playoffs. After winning the Presidens’ Trophy obviously, that’s not the result they wanted. Now, they bring back their stacked roster with a new goalie.
The Avalanche traded for Darcy Kuemper after they lost Philipp Grubauer to the Seattle Kraken in free agency. Kuemper had just a .907 goals against average in Arizona last year but he was excellent the two years prior posting a .928 and .925 save percentage in 2020 and 2019.
Still, the expectation is for Colorado to roll through the West. Chicago is kind of in a weird place. They just traded off Duncan Keith, who is pretty much done at this point in his career anyway, but are still built around Patrick Kane and Jonathan Toews.
Sure, there’s some solid youngsters like Alex DeBrincat and Dominik Kubalik but beyond that, the roster leaves a lot to be desired. So tonight, what should we look for? Well, I like the Avalanche to win but there’s not much value there so instead, I’ll give you two other plays.
Mikko Rantanen anytime goal scorer +125
The then 24-year-old found his scoring touch last year for the Avalanche as he found the back of the net 30 times in just 52 games. That’s a goal per game rate of .58 which is a 47 goal pace over a full 82 game season.
Colorado led the way with the most goals in the NHL last year with 197. Considering Rantanen was the team leader by a whopping 10 goals, more likely than not he is going to find the net for this team.
Total Over 6.5 goals +100
When playing the Avalanche, always bet the over. This team scores goals at an insane clip, an average of 3.5 goals per game last year and they’re going against the team that allowed the eighth-most goals in the league last season.
Obviously, the Blackhawks’ addition of Marc-Andre Fleury should help, he won the Vezina with a .928 save percentage last year but comparatively the Vegas Golden Knights were putting out a much better team in front of him than Chicago will this year.
Blackhawks vs Avalanche Picks
Mikko Rantanen anytime goal scorer +125
Total Over 6.5 goals +100