Alex Smith
Calgary at Columbus
Play: Columbus -1.5
The Calgary Flames continue their six-game East Coast road trip tonight against the Columbus Blue Jackets. Currently near the bottom of the Pacific Division, the Flames have won three of their last five games after losing six of their previous seven games. Their offensive production has slowed down as of late, scoring two or fewer goals in 10 of their last 12 contests. Winger Johnny Gaudreau is out indefinitely with a broken finger. Before his injury on November 15th, where he scored the Flames only goal on the power-play in a 1-0 win at Minnesota, "Johnny Hockey" was leading the club with five goals and 11 points. Another youngster has been picking up the load for Calgary in Matthew Tkachuk. The 19-year old son of former All-Star Keith Tkachuk, Matthew has five goals and four assists in his first 17 games. Columbus has been playing some very strong hockey at the moment, winning eight of its last 11 games. Goaltending and the team’s power play unit have been the catalyst for their recent success. Netminder Sergei Bobrovsky has been electric, winning nine of his last 10 starts, with a 2.19 gaa and a .931 save pct. on the early campaign. The Blue Jackets lead the league with a 31.1% conversion rate on the power play and overall have scored 19 goals over their last five games. Columbus has won 7 of the last 10 meetings versus Calgary and the Flames have lost 10 of their last 15 games as an underdog along with failing to cash in six of their last nine games on the puck-line. My numbers indicate the Jackets should be able to post up a nice victory here, and I'm comfortable laying the -1.5 puck-line with the home favorite.
Brett Atkins
Wednesday night comp play is the Thunder and Kings to head Over the total in Sacramento.
Oklahoma City just played their 3rd straight Over last night in Los Angeles against the Lakers, and OKC happens to be on an overall 6-2 Over run their last 8 games played.
Sacramento had their 3 game Over streak snapped earlier this week against Toronto, but I expect them to get settled in to a higher-scoring game tonight versus the Thunder, as each of the last 3 series meetings between the teams have played Over the posted price.
With Oklahoma City on court last night, I expect this one to be a looser, free-flowing game tonight against the Kings.
Thunder-Kings Over the total.
2* OKLAHOMA CITY-SACRAMENTO OVER
Eric Schroeder
My free play for Wednesday is on the Detroit Pistons minus the points against the struggling Miami Heat, who have nagging injuries to deal with, and will continue to struggle with a loss in Motown.
Detroit (6-9) is 5-2 at home this year, and actually has a better record than the Heat (4-9) at the moment. Miami just lost in Philadelphia two nights back, and now plays its third road game in five nights, after winning in Washington on Saturday.
This is a great spot for the Pistons to snap a four-game skid, after losing in New York, Cleveland and then at home versus Boston and Houston - the team's first only losses in its venue.
Take Detroit tonight.
3* PISTONS
Brad Wilton
Wednesday comp play will be the hot Grizzlies over the hot Sixers.
Philly has put together a 2-game win streak, and Joel Embiid sure looks like he was worth the wait for the Philly faithful. However, Embiid is still limited as to the minutes he plays, and Philadelphia is still without Simmons and Noel, and Okafor just left the last game with an undisclosed injury.
Memphis comes to the City of Brotherly Love having won and covered 5 in a row, and the Grizzlies are also on a 7 game series win streak with a 4-2-1 spread mark in those 7 victories.
76ers finally have a light at the end of the tunnel, but the fact is, they are still at the very start of this long, dark tunnel.
Go with Memphis to roll to win and cover # 6 in a row.
5* MEMPHIS
Chris Jordan
One night after getting their hat handed to them inside Madison Square Garden, the Portland Trail Blazers head to Cleveland for a date with the NBA defending champion Cavaliers. The disappointing start to the 2016-17 campaign continues tonight, as LeBron James and company will hand it to Portland in a blowout win.
The last time these two met as Dec. 26, 2015, when the Cavaliers went into Portland, and the Blazers named it in a 105-76 victory. A 29-point loss, even a year after the fact, can linger. Revenge will also be on the brain.
All Cavs.
2* CLEVELAND
SPORTS WAGERS
Toronto +126 over NEW JERSEY
OT included. The Maple Leafs played last night and dropped a close 2-1 decision to the red-hot Hurricanes. One could argue that the ‘Canes just produced the blueprint on how to play the Maple Leafs and defeat them but the Devils are not in a favorable position to do that. First, New Jersey returns home from a four-game trip through Dallas, Anaheim, Los Angeles and San Jose and failed to score more than twice in any of those games. This now marks the 11th straight game in which the Devils have had to travel to play their next opponent over the past 20 days. It started on November 3 with a three-game trip through Florida, Tampa and Carolina before the Devils returned home for one game against Carolina. Up next was a home and home series with the Sabres that started in Buffalo followed by that aforementioned four-game trip. In 12 games against top-16 teams, the Devils are 3-9 and they’re also 1-5 against top-10 teams. Those results reveal that the Devils .500 record has been made possible by defeating the lower echelon teams in the NHL. With rookie D-man Yohann Auvitu on the rack (he's been updated to probable) along with Taylor Hall, Kyle Palmieri and Mike Cammalleri, one really has to wonder where the scoring is going to come from on this already offensively challenged bunch.
Auston Matthews, even with his scoring slump, has been fantastic. Like Connor McDavid, who was on a 10-game scoreless drought, Matthews is about to break out too. Mitch Marner is another rising star who has been Toronto’s best player on the ice on many nights. There might not be enough depth on defense or experience to pull off major upsets consistently but this is not an upset by any stretch and the sheer amount of skill on this roster makes the Leafs a threat every time out. Mike Babcock was not happy after last night’s game, insisting that his players have to want those loose pucks more than the opposition in tight, scrappy, low-scoring games. We trust they got the message and we also trust them for a big effort here.