Good morning, all! This is a difficult point in the DFS regular season because we've reached the point where some clubs may be resting players that have already clinched a playoff spot. While we do still have a couple of wild card spots up for grabs in either conference, I'm building my lineup today with two criteria in mind: value and popularity.

I will add that I am only playing the main slate tonight, but for those out there playing in all-day tournaments, I do really like the spot for the Hurricanes going up against the Rangers.

Slate Preview

Winnipeg

Through all the pain, I remain a Hawks fan. With that said, I watch a lot of this club, meaning that I've seen this movie against Winnipeg before. In the last ten games against each other, the Jets have a 9-0-1 record against this Hawks club, with most of those contests being over after the first five minutes of the game. For me, I have interest in Winnipeg, but I'm mainly interested in a broken-up stack with middle-six players. Nikolaj Ehlers at $5,800 is an excellent price for him in a great matchup and can see myself pairing him with maybe Nino Niederreiter at $4,000, along with some pieces on the blueline. If you want to go up to the top line against the Hawks, I won't say no at all, but I may try and get some exposure at lower-priced players and build a lineup to where I can fit in an expensive one-off here or there.

Vegas

Vegas is at home (green check mark), affordable (green check mark), and in a great matchup (double-green checkmark). I love the Golden Knights on this slate, starting at the top with Jack Eichel at $7,400. He's listed now as DTD, but if he's in the lineup tonight then I can see myself trying to make room to add him. He hasn't had nearly as many multi-point games as he did earlier in the season, but the price is at a good number for me to want to add him in on my build. Where I'm most interested though is getting in on Tomas Hertl at $5,600 and Mark Stone at $5,500 – that's excellent value tonight, so I'll take it. If Eichel is listed out, you can add in William Karlsson in at $5,500, but there are enough center options tonight to where you may be able to fade him and bring in someone else.  

Seattle

Nobody plays Seattle players in DFS, and I can't blame anyone for fading them. They usually have zero power-play correlation and for reasons I'll never understand, they try and split ice-time throughout their forward groups. However, every now and again they build a line that's fully correlated and when that happens, I try and take advantage of this. I did something similar in early December this season and had some success so let's see if we can't have that same outcome take place. I'll be targeting the Kraken second line of Jared McCann ($5,800), Shane Wright ($4,600), and Andre Burakovsky ($3,100), who skate together at all strengths and are priced down enough to where if you put together a build with them included, you would have salary left to fit two expensive one-offs in. Seattle might be my ringer tonight in single-entry just based off their price alone.

Defensemen

Top of the board is still Roman Josi who is hurt, and I can't say I'd be there tonight to roster who is right below him in Quinn Hughes at $6,800. Josh Morrissey is in a great matchup, as I like him at $6,100 and if you decide to go with a cheaper option on the Jets blueline, that's fine as well. Shea Theodore comes up for me again at $5,700 but if you want to save salary and still play Vegas, you can add in Noah Hanifin at $5,100. Philip Broberg for St. Louis is a solid play here at $4,600 and in the low $4K's, I like Vince Dunn at $4,200, Kaiden Guhle at $4,100, and Filip Hronek at $4,000. Cheaper defensemen tonight you could go with Sam Rinzel for the Hawks at $3,600 or drop down even further for Brandon Carlo at $3,100.

Goalies

I actually like this goaltending slate tonight, with my ceiling being Thatcher Demko at $7,900. I don't mind the other side of that matchup either, going to Filip Gustavsson at $7,500. Juuse Saros for Nashville at $7,100 is fine if you're fading Vegas, and I'd be willing to roster Justus Annunen as well for that same price if he gets the start in net tonight for the Preds. If you're fading the Jets you can go with either Hawks starter, but this would only be necessary if you absolutely need to save on salary.  

Good luck tonight everybody!  

For continued fantasy news and notes, follow me on Twitter @ndySanz.