Nashville Tries to Hang in the Wild Card Race
PREVIEW: Edmonton Oilers (42-26-6, 2nd in Pacific) at Nashville Predators (41-26-5, 4th in Central)
The NHL Regular season home stretch is here with only a few more weeks remaining before the playoffs. Teams are making their final run to reach the postseason.
The Edmonton Oilers appear headed for a very respectable second-place finish in their division and likely will make the postseason with a high-scoring offense.
However, the Nashville Predators are clawing and scratching for one of the wild card spots. They are just a few points ahead of the Dallas Stars while the Las Vegas Golden Knights are currently on the outside looking in, and need to make a move fast. All Nashville needs to do is win enough to keep ahead of those two threats, and that won't be easy against the Oilers.
The Preds are just 5-4-1 in their last ten games. The Oilers have fared far better at 7-2-1, but have also lost two straight. Let's also put those two recent losses into perspective -- they lost to Colorado and Minnesota, two of the hottest teams in the NHL.
The puck drop in Nashville is Thursday at 7:00 pm CST.
OPINION (powered by Pointspreads.ca):
Nashville has been way too inconsistent to back with confidence. They've struggled against better competition lately, while Edmonton tends to beat the teams they should.
Even though this game means more to the Predators given their playoff prospects, we don't see the Oilers dropping three straight. So, we'll look to bet on Edmonton.
