Welcome back to another edition of Lining Up, this week will focus on two hot lines from the last three weeks and how the players can help your rosters in the short and long term.

Let's not waste time with pleasantries and dive in.

Anders Lee – Bo Horvat – Mathew Barzal

Looking at the top even strength line combinations over the last three weeks, third on the list and performing slightly better than a line that features Nathan MacKinnon and Mikko Rantanen is the top line from the New York Islanders. Over this same span, the Islanders are 7-1, third in goals for across the league and converting at nearly 27% on the power play. The team is on a torrid pace at the moment considering last year they were 22^nd in goals for. Leading the charge is Mathew Barzal who is up to 13 points in his last six games and is on pace for a monster 91 points this season. He has increased his shot volume so far this season to over three shots per game while seeing very similar TOI and power play usage. Barzal has so far been able to sustain these numbers without exceeding normal levels in his underlying metrics. His personal shooting percentage is a comfortable 10.6%, his 5on5 shooting percentage is at 8.5%, he has a PDO of 1017 and a secondary assist percentage of 35%. That he is on such a great scoring pace while showing excellent underlying metrics indicates that we should not necessarily expect an imminent drop in production. Certainly, two points per game is high but moving closer to a point per game mark is very realistic and would be a pace he has not had since his first full season in 2017-2018.

Joining in on the fun is Bo Horvat whose value took a nosedive after moving to New York last year from Vancouver. Given that Barzal missed some significant time last season due to injury, perhaps owners were too quick to judge, and the duo simply needed a bit more time together in order to form some chemistry. Whatever the reason, Horvat is currently on a seven-game point streak with 11 points in that span. Similarly to Barzal, Horvat has sustainable underlying numbers that indicate the bottom should not totally fall out from under him. His personal shooting percentage is at 13% but that is actually down from his last two seasons where he scored on 16.3% of his shots over 149 games. Horvat is an efficient shooter, so his current rate is sustainable so long as he continues to take three shots per game as he does now.

The third wheel on the line here is Anders Lee who has spent 38% of his time at even strength with Barzal and Horvat although is conspicuously absent from the scoring streak that his linemates are on. He is having a poor season so far and is only on pace for 30 points which would be his worst season in nearly a decade. He is still shooting and hitting so he can contribute to some peripheral categories but the biggest gap between this and previous seasons is his ice time which is down over two full minutes from last year as well as his power play usage which has also been nearly halved. However, he is readily available in most leagues at 37% rostered in Yahoo leagues and 31% in Fantrax and all of his advanced metrics indicate he should have positive regression coming and increased production. There is hope with this current line deployment and the schedule for New York this week.

Barzal and Horvat are likely rostered in most leagues, but it may be worth investigating their value in a trade if managers think their production will disappear. It probably won't quite be so good moving forward but the underlying analytics for both players suggests continued production. Lee on the other hand is worth a gamble on in the short term so long as he is lining up alongside the two studs, especially since the Islanders have three games remaining this week, including matchups against Anaheim and Montreal.

Ondrej Palat – Nico Hischier – Jesper Bratt

Fourth on the same list of hot lines at even strength over the last three weeks and right behind the MacKinnon and Rantanen line is Nico Hischier, Jesper Bratt and Ondrej Palat. Since returning from injury, Hischier has slotted right back in alongside his linemates and has seemingly not missed a beat with 10 points in eight games since returning. Unlike his counterparts on New York, Hischier has an above average shooting percentage at 19.4% and is taking one fewer shot per game than he did last season. Owners will want to see that shot output increase in order to mitigate a regression in his shooting percentage. With seven points in his last five games, Bratt certainly seems to have missed his partner as he is now on pace to finish with 101 points. Just as everyone expected right? A high shooting percentage of his own indicates he will slow down but the good news for Bratt is that he's seeing nearly two full minutes more of TOI this season. So, the steady slot alongside Hischier and the usage should allow for Bratt to exceed his career high of 73 points. The third piece to this line combination, the Anders Lee of the group, is Palat who has also not joined in on the scoring in spite of playing 33% of his time at even strength with Hischier and Bratt, and even more time with Bratt alone while Hischier was injured. He is showing some signs of life as he has two points in his last three games and like Lee, there is optimism that so long as he holds this deployment, he could provide short term value.

Aside from high shooting percentages, Hischier and Bratt have otherwise very sustainable underlying metrics and Bratt has the increased usage this season to surpass his career high point total if you can find a manager who is expecting him to go completely cold moving forward. Otherwise, New Jersey also has three games to come this week, including a back-to-back matchup on the weekend against Columbus and Anaheim so consider taking a gamble on Palat who is 3% owned in Yahoo leagues and 16% in Fantrax.