Welcome back to another edition of Lining Up. Coming up to the holidays, we will look at some players working with high or low shooting percentages and the line deployment that is driving them to hot streaks. The Player Usage Chart will also assist with dissecting some of the underlying analytics behind a line combination's performance and hopefully provide some insight into how they could produce moving forward. As always, keep on the lineups as they can change frequently and within games.

Let's dive in.

Taylor Hall – Charlie Coyle

Despite being moved away from the team's top stars and losing his place on the top power-play unit with them, Hall has found himself thriving and is currently on an eight-point streak over his last six games playing predominantly with Charlie Coyle and Trent Frederic on the third line, receiving secondary power-play minutes. The most likely culprit for his increased production is a marginally higher than normal shooting percentage at 14.1%. The last time he had a sustained percentage at 14% was when he won the Art Ross Trophy on New Jersey in 2017-2018 so it seems likely based on this information that he will repeat that 100-point pace from Boston's third line…

Regardless, the benefit of being on the third line means that Hall is deployed against lesser competition. When examining his Player Usage Chart in the Advanced Stats tab of his profile on Frozen Tools, we notice that this has indeed been the case. Hall is seeing a very low quality of competition relative to his team and, as expected, is driving play against them. As a trio with Charlie Coyle and Trent Frederic, they have been driving possession against their opposition with a 59 CF% and the line has connected for six goals and only three against. While the bulk of prime offensive zone deployment still goes to the lines containing one of Patrice Bergeron, Brad Marchand or David Pastrnak, the chart shows that the Hall line is still being given favourable deployment.

For his part and to a lesser extent, line mate Charlie Coyle has also been hot recently with four points in his past three games. In multi-category leagues that also count face-offs, Coyle is currently having a career year at the dot with a 54.4 FOW% and is averaging 1.9 shots and 1.5 blocks and hits per game. Solid peripheral contribution from a third-line center to go along with a hot streak in points.

Boston has three games remaining this week including matches against L.A and Columbus although on busy nights if there is room on your roster. Next week they will play three games between Monday and Friday with two of those coming on light days. Hall is rostered in 61% of Yahoo leagues and so may likely be available still. If not, consider adding Coyle in the short-term while he is on a streak as he is available in 95% of leagues.

Jack Roslovic

Columbus has recently split their top scorers Johnny Gaudreau and Patrick Laine and while it may impact each of their respective fantasy outputs, it spreads the wealth across the lineup. The most recent beneficiary has been Jack Roslovic who, based on ice time, is now on the de facto second line with Patrik Laine and Yegor Chinakhov. In the last three games they have connected for four goals and only one against while Roslovic himself is on a three-game point streak with six points during that span, including a monster four-point outing against L.A on Sunday. He may even have more to give as his shooting percentage is currently low at 7.9% compared to his recent three-year average of 14.6%. If he begins to regress closer to that average, it means he has an extra 2-3 goals on the season. Lining up with Laine as opposed to Jakub Voracek and Kent Johnson could certainly help.

Columbus has a tough road trip this week but will kick next week off with a back-to-back on Monday and Tuesday and has two games on off-nights against Philadelphia and Chicago. At only 5% rostered in Yahoo leagues you will want to keep an eye on his continued deployment, don't be surprised if his streak is ended this week but it could pick right back against softer competition.

Rickard Rakell

Rickard Rakell has lately been lining up alongside Sidney Crosby and Jake Guentzel on not only the top line but also supplanting Bryan Rust on the top power-play unit. The results have been as expected so far with four points in his last four games including two on the power-play. With just a short amount of exposure to this level of talent, Rickard is already on pace to exceed his point total from the last five seasons. No doubt leaving Anaheim alone is a contributing factor but certainly the deployment is the main driving force. Rakell is also adding value in multi-category formats as he has 3.1 shots per game, a career high pace, as well as 1.7 hits. Those numbers and 55-point pace can be very valuable. Consider adding Rakell while he is playing on the top line in Pittsburgh.

Thanks for reading.