NHL Hockey: Dallas Stars at Columbus Blue Jackets

By BetOnline October 15, 2019

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Non conference matchup in C-Bus on Wednesday as the hometown Blue Jackets take on the Dallas Stars. The expectation heading into the year was that Columbus would sink like a stone to the bottom of the Eastern Conference standings after losing a ton of talent to free agency including top goaltender Sergei Bobrovsky. So far that hasn’t happened and the Jackets are 2-3-0 but enter this contest having won 2 of their last 3. More impressively, the wins came at home against the Buffalo Sabres and on the road against the Hurricanes at Carolina.

Not much has gone right for Dallas this season as evidenced by their 1-5-1 record through 7 games. Their first four losses were all by a single goal but their last two have been multi-goal defeats to Washington at home 4-1 and at Buffalo 4-0. Their only win was an upset over the Capitals in Washington on October 8. The Stars problem is simple to diagnose–they haven’t been scoring goals. Not that this is a huge surprise–they were the #28 scoring offense last season but had a nasty defense that finished #2 in team goals against per game (2.44). This year, however, they’re not scoring goals but have been mediocre at best defensively. They’re ranked #30 in team offense scoring just 1.86 goals per game but #14 in scoring defense allowing 3.14 goals per game. That adds up to a -1.29 differential that is near the bottom of the table at #26.

The Stars aren’t getting goals nor are they getting shots on goal ranking #29 in shots per game (27.4). The good news is that they’ve done a nice job containing their opponents allowing just 27.3 shots against which is third best in the league. So far, the issue has been their goaltending which has been decidedly middling. Starter Ben Bishop hasn’t been too bad this year with a 1-3-1 record and a 2.78 goals against average. Backup Anton Khudobin has a record of 0-2 with a 3.59 goals against average.

Until the Stars tighten up defensively and/or start scoring some goals they’re a go-against in most situations. Columbus has more upside at this juncture and we’ll look for them to get the win here. Jackets have won 4 straight in the series against Dallas. All four games went ‘Under’ the total. We’ll bet this one accordingly.