St. Louis Travels To San Jose To Open Western Conference Finals

The Stanley Cup playoffs are down to just four teams. In the Eastern Conference, the Boston Bruins hold a one game lead over the Carolina Hurricanes with Game 2 set for Sunday at the TD Garden. In the Western Conference, the St. Louis Blues will get their final round against the San Jose Sharks underway at California’s SAP Center–known colloquially as the ‘Shark Tank’.

Neither team had an easy route to this point. San Jose looked to be on the verge of elimination during their opening round series against the Vegas Golden Knights but after falling down 3-1 with Game 5 set for the T-Mobile Arena they won three straight to advance. They went from the ‘frying pan into the fire’ in the second round, taking on a rapidly improving Colorado Avalanche team in what would be another seven game series. Four of the 7 games were decided by a single goal including an overtime in Game 6. Ultimately, the Sharks took a 3-2 decision in Game 7 to earn their spot in the Western Conference Finals.

The St. Louis Blues have been fighting for most of 2019. On January 3, they were dead last in the National Hockey League standings and certainly didn’t look like a team on the verge of competing for the Stanley Cup. Due in large part to the breakout performance of rookie goaltender Jordan Bennington, they turned things around going 29-10-5 the rest of the way in the regular season. They opened the playoffs by eliminating the Winnipeg Jets in six games and then outlasted the Dallas Stars in a seven game series. The final game of the series took two overtimes to decide.

Although the Blues finished fifth in the Western Conference and the Sharks second, the teams were separated by a mere two points. The Blues were particularly good way from home going 21-13-7 while the Sharks went 25-11-5 on their home ice. Head to head play in recent years was also nearly dead even. The Blues hold a 5-4-0 edge overall in the last three seasons though San Jose has a 3-2 advantage on home ice. None of these nine games exceeded the total with 6 ‘Under’ and 3 push.

From a betting standpoint, it’s hard to argue that the Sharks were anything but overvalued for much of the season. Despite finishing with 101 points they have lost -9.4 units to date for their ‘financial backers’. The Blues didn’t make a ton of money for NHL betting enthusiasts though they are ‘in the black’ with a profit of 3.1 units on the year. This series should be extremely competitive and in this game at least the only way to play it is to take the underdog price on the NHL betting line. We’ll also take this one ‘Under’ the total.

BET ST. LOUIS BLUES +116 OVER SAN JOSE SHARKS
BET ST. LOUIS BLUES/SAN JOSE SHARKS UNDER 5.5 -120

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