Overview
The Minnesota Wild are in Carolina Friday where they take on the Hurricanes. The Wild and Hurricanes don’t play each other very often so head to head trends might now mean a whole lot but the Wild have won the last 3 meetings including a 6-3 win last month.
Head to Head Trends
Wild are 3-0 in the last 3 meetings overall.
Wild are 1-5 in the last 6 meetings in Carolina.
Carolina Hurricanes (+110)
The Carolina Hurricanes are 8th in the Metropolitan Division with 55 points 17 points out of the final playoff spot so they’re definitely not going to be playing in the post season. The Hurricanes had a horrible start to the season losing their first 8 games of the season and it didn’t really get much better as they were just 10-27 after their first 37 games but since the start of 2015 they have actually played pretty good with a 14-11 record. The Hurricanes are solid on defense and they actually have the best penalty kill in the league at over 88% but offense has been their main problem averaging just 2.3 goals per game.
Carolina Hurricanes Trends
Hurricanes are 28-57 in their last 85 vs. a team with a winning record.
Hurricanes are 18-40 in their last 58 games playing on 3 or more days rest.
Minnesota Wild (-130)
The Minnesota Wild are 4th in the Central Division with 77 points and are looking fairly good to make the playoffs especially if they can continue playing the way they have been over the past few weeks. Just a few weeks ago it looked like the chances of the Wild making the playoffs were slim to none but after winning 15 of their last 18 games they are not only right there in the mix but they look like a team that could do some real damage come playoff time. The Wild have a solid offense averaging 2.8 goals per game and they’re also pretty good on defense allowing 2.6 goals per game. The thing that I really like about this Wild team is that they have the best shot differential in the league at +4.6 so they do tend to outplay their opponents on most nights.
Minnesota Wild Trends
Wild are 5-0 in their last 5 road games.
Wild are 17-5 in their last 22 overall.
Conclusion
I’m going with the Minnesota Wild over the Hurricanes in this one. The Cane’s have been playing much better since the New Year but the Wild are just steamrolling teams lately so it’s hard to go against them right now.
Free Pick: Minnesota Wild -130
