NHL Grind Down: Thursday, March 10th - Page Two

New Jersey Devils at San Jose Sharks – 10:30 PM EST

New Jersey Devils San Jose Sharks
Article Image Keith Kinkaid Article Image Martin Jones
Record Record
31-29-7 37-23-6
Stats GF/GP GA/GP PP% PK% Stats GF/GP GA/GP PP% PK%
Team Stats 2.18 2.45 21.00% 82.00% Team Stats 2.95 2.59 22.20% 79.50%

The lone late game features New Jersey and San Jose, with the Sharks as big favorites on home ice. These two teams are heading in opposite directions, with the Devils winning only twice in their past 10 games, while the Sharks have won five of their last six. New Jersey was a strong defensive team for the first half of the year, but have really struggled lately, with 40 goals allowed in that 10 game stretch. Perhaps their poor possession game has finally caught up with them (29th ranked for Corsi-For percentage) and goaltender Cory Schneider has been injured and not able to bail them out. In the other crease, goaltender Martin Jones is a good play in goal considering that the Sharks should win this game easily, however the Devils rank dead last in shots per game, so Jones might not score that high for points even if he does get the win.

The Sharks’ offense will be extremely popular in DFS hockey tonight in all game formats. Any of their top three lines could be stacked for tournaments, and it may even be worthwhile to get creative with stack options to try to go against the grain (i.e. power play unit stacks, two defensemen-two forward stacks). For cash game lineups, multiple Sharks players should be included and ideally at least one from each of the top two lines. Of course, the top play from the Sharks and potentially the top play overall tonight is defenseman Brent Burns, who will be very highly owned, even with his huge salary. Burns’ offensive numbers more closely resemble a goal scoring winger than a defenseman, as he leads all blueliners in goals scored and has a large lead in shots on goal. In addition to Burns, the Sharks’ top line of Joe Pavelski, Joe Thornton and Tomas Hertl will also be very popular, but despite that, this line has been scoring very consistently and shouldn’t be faded. The second and third lines have plenty of other targets and at different salary ranges, and Marc-Edouard Vlasic is another player to consider on defense.

Elite Plays

NJ: None

SJ: Brent Burns, Joe Pavelski, Joe Thornton

Secondary Plays

NJ: Adam Henrique, Kyle Palmieri

SJ: Martin Jones, Tomas Hertl, Logan Couture, Patrick Marleau, Marc-Edouard Vlasic, Joonas Donskoi

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About the Author

maxdout
Sean Chard (maxdout)

Sean Chard (maxdout) is a Daily Fantasy Sports veteran, starting back during the 2011/12 NHL season. He lives in the Toronto area so naturally he is a fan of the Blue Jays, Raptors and Maple Leafs. maxdout is a grinder for all DFS sports and most notably NHL and MLB. His biggest DFS result to date is a 7th place finish in the FanDuel Daily Fantasy Baseball Championship in 2013. He can be found on twitter at @maxdoutDFS.