Welcome back to another day of NHL Predictions. Each day, Last Word on Hockey takes a look at the games that are happening and gives our predictions for each one, breaking down head-to-head and other factors that may play in. We also have a featured game of the day, which is considered must-watch TV. Today’s featured game is the Arizona Coyotes vs Los Angeles Kings.
NHL Predictions With Arizona Coyotes vs Los Angeles Kings
For anyone at home keeping score, I am now 21-6 in my predictions this year. So if you want to be 77.78% certain of who will win tonight, you’ve come to the right place.
Now that I’ve surely jinxed myself, let’s get into tonight’s predictions.
Chicago Blackhawks vs Vancouver Canucks
Head-to-Head: Blackhawks 0 – 1 Canucks
The Chicago Blackhawks are on what some would call a “heater”. After a tumultuous start to the season, the Blackhawks have picked up five wins in their last seven and currently are riding a four-game win streak (as of November 19). Now because I am writing this before the end of their game against the Edmonton Oilers, it is hard to say what kind of Blackhawks team we will get. Playing back-to-back is never easy, especially when it’s on the road, and especially when you are playing a team that loves the run and gun hockey as the Oilers do.
The Vancouver Canucks are coming off a rare, gutsy win against the Winnipeg Jets the other night. Vancouver has seemed to have lost their identity this season and a win against the Jets seems to only partially stall this free fall. Vancouver still has glaring holes on defence and even though they won the other night, they were outshot 39 to 29, including blocking 18 other shot attempts. You aren’t going to get lucky enough every night to pull out wins after defensive performances like that.
Without the back-to-back, I’m taking Chicago all day long, but this is a bit of a tougher pick. Ahh, I’m still picking the Hawks.
Chicago wins 4-2
Washington Capitals vs Seattle Kraken
Head-to-Head: Capitals 0 – 0 Kraken
The Washington Capitals are another team coming off a back-to-back in this one. It’s never easy predicting winners in this because a team that looks poised to win on paper could just come out flat and drained on a back-to-back road trip. But the Seattle Kraken are bad. Very bad. I don’t know where people were getting the idea at the beginning of the year saying this team would be top three in the Pacific Division, but they clearly didn’t take a close look at how this team was built. Doesn’t matter how good your goalies are, when you don’t have defence, you’re going to get exposed.
Seattle is on a six-game losing streak and has been outscored 31-17 in that span. Not a bad goals-for actually, but pretty horrendous goals against. Washington is led by a guy who does one thing very well in this league, and that is score. Alex Ovechkin has to be licking his lips at this matchup as he continues his quest for NHL goal-scoring supremacy.
Washington wins 5-1
Arizona Coyotes vs Los Angeles Kings
Head-to-Head Coyotes 0 – 0 Kings
This is my third Arizona prediction of the season and so far I’m two for two. I’ve predicted a win for them and predicted a very easy loss. In fact, with only two wins on the year for Arizona, they’ve been pretty easy to predict. So that win I took on them is pretty impressive. Yes, I’m tooting my own horn here. Now I don’t take joy in my wins over another teams’ losses. I wish this Arizona team was better. But they aren’t. It’s going to be a long season and that continues tonight.
The Los Angeles Kings are looking to right the ship during this seven-game homestand. After back-to-back losses, the Kings get a favourable matchup against a Coyotes team that has improved in play a bit recently but is still not on the same level as the Kings. Or anyone else in the league for that matter. Sorry, this is becoming a bit of a Coyotes roast.
Arizona kept it close against the Columbus Blue Jackets the other night. They showed a lot of poise coming back from multiple deficits and defenceman Jakob Chychrun even brought a lot of pace with his game to help tie it up late in the third with a snapper from the top of the left circle.
Arizona may not win a lot of games, but their level of play has increased substantially from the start of the year. It’s making for some pretty entertaining hockey lately. I’m going Kings in this one though.
LA wins 5-4
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