Familiarity can be a motivational tool.  When an opponent is in the same division, a team is offered the opportunity to knock its adversary into a worse position in the standings or make up ground in the quest to leapfrog it. These two desires drive competitive matchups. 

But most games are played outside the division, and if you can’t beat the other teams in your conference, or in the other conference, you lack the primary ingredient for a deep Stanley Cup run: consistency. This week, I’m betting on consistency from teams who haven’t played their best hockey of late but I believe have the mettle for a long postseason run. Tasked with vanquishing opponents outside their division, I anticipate a bounceback from these three teams.

Edmonton Oilers at Ottawa Senators
Saturday, February 11 – 12:30 PM ET
As we cruise toward the playoffs, the significance of what has transpired in Edmonton seems like an underappreciated storyline. The Oilers signed goaltender Jack Campbell to solve their goaltending woes. He has been a complete flop. But miraculously, instead of torpedoing the Oilers’ season and wasting a year of Connor McDavid and Leon Draisaitl’s prime, Edmonton has been able to depend on 24-year-old Stuart Skinner to not just keep it afloat but win games. Skinner has been terrific. 

The Oilers have looked flat the last two games. Their skill won out on Tuesday against Detroit, but against the Flyers on Thursday their subdued effort proved costly. Edmonton’s puck management was poor. The Flyers’ only goal at 5-on-5 came off a Draisaitl turnover when he tried to make a cross-seam pass. On breakouts, the Oilers struggled when they were forced to make short-to-intermediate passes. And the Flyers identified that a sluggish Oilers team could be exposed on defence, whether that be in transition (off turnovers) or when hemmed in its own end (where the Flyers found looks in the slot due to slow reads).

The Oilers have been groggy coming out of the All-Star break, but I see this two-game stretch as a hiccup. If you look at their recent advanced stats in 2023, the arrow for this team is pointing up. Since December 1st, they rank in the top four in expected goals and high-danger chances percentage, with their record nearly identical to the Toronto Maple Leafs.

The Oilers are in the middle of a four-game road trip, and that is a good thing because they have found comfort on the road, having one of the best records away from their rink of any team in the league. I’m expecting a big rebound performance from Edmonton on Saturday. The Oilers haven’t lost consecutive road games since before American Thanksgiving, and I have a tough time envisioning the Ottawa Senators containing them in this game. Coach Jay Woodcroft has done a nice job crafting the Oilers’ offence – they were first in goals per game before Thursday night and they are still first on the power play – while keeping their opponents honest when they have the puck. 

When the Oilers are focused, they have an unrelenting attack. On the penalty kill, they look to stretch the ice and score. If there is an errant puck, an Oilers’ wing will leak out of the zone, pushing the opposing defence back to avoid getting torched by a breakaway. The Oilers’ wings function as the tip of the spear in transition, and that can allow for a staggered rush as the center catches up. For a team that spreads the ice well and can make wing-to-wing passes, this can be pretty darn hard to defend.

But for me, it’s the rotations that are the sticking point. The Flyers did a really nice job defending the middle of the ice on Thursday, keeping the Oilers to the perimeter. But Ottawa plays man-on-man defence, and when Edmonton rotates on offence and drags the Senators’ defencemen up high, will Ottawa be able to fortify the slot? 

Opponents know McDavid loves to roll into the slot and fly downhill. They know Zach Hyman will be glued to the far post. They understand Draisaitl will be lurking in the off-slot, and yet, when the Oilers are locked in, opponents can’t stop them even though they know what’s coming. The Senators have a fine penalty kill, but the margin for error against Edmonton is nil. The Flyers gave the Oilers zero power plays on Saturday, but I’m incredibly skeptical Edmonton is goose-egged again. The Oilers’ power play can win the game. They have single players who can win them the game. And now with Skinner’s unexpectedly strong play in net, he can buoy the team too.

The Senators are fast and versatile. Even with the Josh Norris injury, their reconfigured lines showcase the team’s depth at forward. But they have won four straight games, tying their longest win streak of the season. The last two times the Senators had win streaks this long, they lost seven straight and three straight. Maybe no team in the NHL personifies the saying “one step forward, two steps back” more than Ottawa. Add to this that the Oilers have been gangbusters on the road this season, and I will happily grab them on the moneyline.

Pick: Oilers -145

Tampa Bay Lightning at Dallas Stars
Saturday, February 11 – 1:00 PM ET
If the Lightning want to catch the Maple Leafs for second place in the Atlantic Division, their losses this week certainly didn’t do them any favours. With the increasingly likely possibility that Tampa Bay will cede home-ice advantage in the first round of the playoffs to Toronto, there is no time like the present for the Lightning to start beating heavyweights away from Amalie Arena. Dallas is a worthy test.

The Stars are a pain to play. Jake Oettinger is one of the few goaltenders in the league who can hold his own against Andrei Vasilevskiy, and if the Stars can keep the play in front of them, they are difficult to bypass for shots and chances. 

On the forecheck, the Stars are tenacious. They dismantled the Minnesota Wild Wednesday night by making the neutral zone a bottleneck and capitalizing off Wild turnovers and striking off the counterattack. On the faceoff, they are dangerous; sharpshooter Jason Robertson nearly popped in multiple goals off won draws against Minnesota. If the Lightning play against Dallas the way they played on Monday and Tuesday, they will lose by multiple goals.

Before Thursday night, the Lightning’s breakouts were in distress. Against the Florida Panthers and San Jose Sharks, pucks were turned over with alarming frequency. The Lightning didn’t sort out coverage well. They struggled to box out. When they overloaded on the puck beneath the circles, an opponent found the open man. Against the Avs, the Lightning temporarily solved these issues. They avoided getting trapped in their own end by using stretch passes and also signaled a willingness to use the flip pass. On entries, puck-carriers were eager to buttonhook, partly in hope of finding the trailer, but also as a way to dig in to extend offensive zone time. The best way to exit your own zone cleanly is to have your adversary exhausted and rushing to its bench for a change. 

Offensively, this Stars game on Saturday will be fascinating to see what will work and what won’t for Tampa Bay. The Lightning’s most recent victory against the Bruins saw them experience success when they got the puck beneath the goal line and forced the Bruins to make more difficult reads to defend the inverted attack. Given the Stars’ skill at gapping up and eliminating shooting and passing lanes, this would appear like a good strategy for Saturday. 

But the Lightning also love to use give-and-go’s and utilize their defencemen to open up the slot. Against the Sharks on Tuesday night, this four-man attack resulted in Brayden Point’s second goal, with a nice pick by Point to free Mikhail Sergachev. What is the right balance between working the Stars down low and confusing them with motion up high? It’s hard to say, but the latter runs a higher risk, and the Stars certainly possess the transition attack to burn the Lightning if too many players are caught beneath the puck. On the Brandon Hagel goal against the Avs on Thursday, two Lightning defencemen gapped up in an effort to foil the Colorado breakout, leaving Anthony Cirelli as the lone defender for an odd-man rush, which Tampa Bay thwarted and turned into a goal. The Lightning are comfortable taking an aggressive offensive posture because they have Vasilevskiy and you don’t.

Dallas is the only Western Conference team that ranks in the top seven in the NHL in points percentage. Against the six Eastern Conference teams that rank in the Stars’ points percentage tier, including Tampa Bay, Dallas has exactly one win in ten tries this season. Some of those losses came in extra time; nevertheless, the Stars, while very good, are eminently beatable. A sour Tampa Bay highly motivated to make amends for its slow start coming out of the break is exactly the team I want to invest in. 

Pick: Lightning +100

Washington Capitals at Boston Bruins
Saturday, February 11 – 3:30 PM ET
It would be hard to make a less controversial statement than claiming to believe in the Bruins. They are on pace for a historic regular season. Their stats are outstanding. They can crush you with their offence and stifle you with their ruthlessly aggressive defence. 

While the Bruins are a great team whose march to capture the Presidents’ Trophy seems all but assured, there have been few times more ideal to bet on Boston. The no-duh situation is when they are at home, where they bash every opponent. They have a better winning percentage when they have a few days rest. And when they have just lost, wager on a clinically efficient rebound. 

On Saturday, the Bruins play their first game after a ten-day break. Boston lost three of its last four games before the All-Star break, showcasing the first sign of adversity it has had all season. It is important to underscore that the three-game losing streak occurred on the road and with three contests in four nights. Now, with the veterans’ batteries recharged, Boston is primed to carve up the Capitals this weekend.

I have real concerns about the Capitals’ ability to contain the Bruins’ offensive attack, and their prospects of ginning up scoring chances against Boston. Coach Jim Montgomery deserves plaudits for how he has reconfigured the Bruins’ offence. Instead of funneling pucks toward the net in a sop to shot volume, the Bruins utilize four-men rush attacks to open up seams and stagger the rush to create waves. 

The Capitals’ path to victory runs through their defencemen. They’ll want to be tight on those blue line gaps to deny easy entries, something that can be achieved if they have back-check support. Nevertheless, even if the Capitals’ forwards provide back pressure, Boston is slippery against stick checks. A tight gap can unravel when David Pastrnak glides past you with nothing but open space in front of him.

On the cycle, Boston likes to rotate players high while layering the slot. Can Washington box out and keep an eye out when the Bruins roll a skater to the back door? The Capitals play man-on-man defence so Boston will be keen to have Capitals forwards defending its big playmakers in the different levels of the slot. Can the Capitals exit their zone cleanly? Washington is generally intent on carrying the puck out of the zone on breakouts, but the Bruins excel at taking away the boards. The Capitals getting squeezed into passing through the middle to exit their zone is a high-risk strategy they’ll be forced to attempt.

For the Capitals to win, they’ll surely be leaning on their blueliners to feature in the offence. Look for Washington to feed the trailer on the rush only for the puck to be slingshotted forward to the player crashing the crease for the low-slot tip. The danger is a rush sequence developing too slowly, which, when defused, leads to a Bruins’ counterattack. When the Bruins can stay in front of the puck, they’re a headache to generate chances against. Clever opponents have utilized the area behind the net to scramble Boston’s ability to sort out coverage.

Even if the Capitals get a heroic effort from their skaters, the goaltending edge tilts toward Boston. Assuming Linus Ullmark gets the start, the Bruins will be relying on the heavy favourite for the Vezina Trophy. At home, I like the Bruins to take care of business, and think with lots of rest and still smarting from their bad spell before the All-Star break, they’ll be motivated to win by a healthy spread.

Pick: Bruins -180