Daily Fantasy Hockey Value Update – December 9

This is a great game to stack Penguins, including starting goalie Marc-André Fleury.

Carolina Hurricanes at Vancouver Canucks

Very quietly, the Carolina Hurricanes have been playing some of the best hockey in the NHL over the last couple of weeks.

After a start to the season that saw the team go 8-10-5, they have now gone 5-2 in their last seven games and now allowed more than 31 shots against in six straight games. They haven’t played exclusively slouches either, as they have wins against Nashville and San Jose mixed in there.

The top line of E.Staal/Skinner/Ruutu continues to be the catalyst for the offense, while on the other side of the coin, Sedin/Sedin/Kesler continue to be the catalysts for Vancouver. None of this should come as a surprise, but it gives you an indication of who to target.

This could be a higher scoring game than perhaps anticipated. Neither Cam Ward nor Eddie Lack (both goalies expected to start, neither are confirmed as of yet) have played particularly well over the course of the season, Carolina is starting a Western road trip and Vancouver is playing the second game of a back-to-back. I’m not a fan of the goalies today, but there are players to pick here.

New York Islanders at Anaheim Ducks

The Islanders continue their Western Conference road trip, having already lost their first two games to St. Louis and Los Angeles by a combined score of 8-1. It doesn’t get any easier tonight in their game against the Pacific Division-leading Ducks.

The Islanders just don’t have any depth. Beyond the Tavares line, and maybe with a dash of the second line, there are a whole lot of mediocre players. That doesn’t mean the Tavares line can’t score. In fact, Anaheim notoriously relies on the not-Getzlaf line to shutdown the other team’s top line. Tavares and co. are good enough to score on Anaheim’s depth players.

That doesn’t mean the Ducks aren’t going to wax the Islanders tonight. Over their last three games, going 2-0-1 against St. Louis, Chicago and Los Angeles, the Ducks’ power play is operating at a 33.3-percent clip, while their penalty kill is a stout 92.3-percent. This game is about the Ducks, and I would only take Islanders players if Anaheim goalie Jonas Hiller starts (not confirmed yet).

Good luck with today’s games!

Michael Clifford

Michael Clifford was born and raised in Fredericton, New Brunswick, Canada and is a graduate of the Unviersity of New Brunswick. He writes about fantasy hockey and baseball for XNSports and FantasyTrade411.com. He can be reached on Twitter @SlimCliffy for any fantasy hockey questions. Follow @SlimCliffy !function(d,s,id){var js,fjs=d.getElementsByTagName(s)[0],p=/^http:/.test(d.location)?'http':'https';if(!d.getElementById(id)){js=d.createElement(s);js.id=id;js.src=p+'://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js';fjs.parentNode.insertBefore(js,fjs);}}(document, 'script', 'twitter-wjs');

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