Minnesota @ COLORADO
COLORADO -½ +150 over Minnesota

BEST LINES:  Pinnacle -½ +150 BET 365 -½ +140 SportsInteraction -½ +155 5DIMES -½ +150

Posted at 3:30 PM EST.

8:35 PM EST. Regulation only. The Wild have six straight playoff berths, clearing 100 points three times in the past four seasons, so the fact they return with a similar roster to last year in theory gives them a high floor. They bring back their entire top-nine forward group and top four defensemen. That’s nice but let’s call it what it is. Eric Staal, who was written off for dead by many, tied a team record with 42 goals last year. That’s not happening again. It’s telling that a team so consistently competitive parted ways with its GM, replacing Chuck Fletcher with Paul Fenton. The Wild simply aren’t ascending. They’ve bowed out in the first round of the playoffs four times and the second round twice during this era of “success.” And they added almost nothing in free agency, hampered by hefty contracts such as Zach Parise’s, so there’s little reason to expect anything better than mediocrity. In fact, even mediocrity doesn’t seem assured. Workhorse defender Ryan Suter is coming off a broken ankle, for which he required a long recovery period. While he’ll be ready for the start of the season, he’s 33 and thus not a lock to come back as good as he was, which is scary news for a team that ranked 21st in goals against last year. Many of the Wild’s most important players are long in the tooth. Koivu is 35, Staal 33, Parise 34. If a team that hasn’t made any progress keeps getting older while its divisional neighbors, like St. Louis, make major off-season additions, it’s only a matter of time before the stagnant team starts to sink, especially in the deadly Central.

Enter the Avalanche, a team that made a stunning 47-point improvement from the previous year and when a team does that, we are usually in favor of regression. However, for this opening night game, we’ll get behind the upstart Avs because they’re so difficult to beat at home and because this opponent is so beatable. Aside from that, the Avs may not regress at all.

Nathan MacKinnon, Gabriel Landeskog and Mikko Rantanen is perhaps the most lethal line in the game. The 5-on-5 Corsi stats show all three players faced some of the league’s highest quality of competition but it didn’t stop them from dominating play. On defense, Erik Johnson and Tyson Barrie finally got some help last season with Nikita Zadorov taking a step forward while Samuel Girard, acquired in the Matt Duchene deal, looks like a future power-play quarterback. Semyon Varlamov was capable when healthy last season but got hurt when Colorado needed him most. He sat out the playoffs. Knowing he’s an injury risk – and that he’s entering the final year of his contract – GM Joe Sakic acquired Philipp Grubauer from Washington. He’s been one of the game’s top backups for a couple seasons, and his rate stats were as good as any goalie in the league last year. Varlamov starts tonight but if he gets injured, the Avs don’t suffer.

The Avs had the 10th best offense last year and it could be better this year with the addition of Matt Calvert or the potential breakout of others, most notably Tyson Jost. The upside to his game is obvious and his ability at both ends of the rink is what makes him so valuable. There’s no doubt Jost has another gear he can hit and he had his moments of brilliance in the Avalanche lineup last season. Perhaps most important is the enthusiasm and will to win that this team possesses every time it takes the ice. The Avs lost to the Stanley Cup favorite last year (Nashville) in the first round but outplayed the Preds for stretches in that series before bowing out after six games. We’ll get behind them here in their first game of the season with such a sweet take-back spotting a half a puck.

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Our Pick

COLORADO -½ +150 (Risking 2 units - To Win: 3.00)

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Chicago +167 over Ottawa