DraftKings has dubbed the next few days "Hockey Week" and I am here for it. You may be thinking what exactly qualifies this as "hockey week" since as far as the NHL schedule is concerned nothing is really out of the ordinary. Well in fact it has nothing to do with the NHL at all, it's simply "hockey week" because the NBA is on their All-Star break and DraftKings (and FanDuel) want to draw their NBA fantasy players over to hockey. The result is some jacked up NHL contests for the next few days. The combination of higher prize pools (albeit at the cost of larger contest fields) and unexperienced players could make this a great time to be playing NHL DFS.

If you are one of these new players giving NHL DFS a shot for the first time and stumbled across this article, here's a few tips to keep in mind.

1. Shots are king. Outside of actually scoring goals, players who shoot often are who you want to target. With a bonus awarded for five shots on goal, a player who hits that mark will score more points than a player who simply has one shot and one goal.
   
2. Correlation is key. Similar to MLB and NFL DFS, when one player is doing well there is a good chance that player is raising the performance of those around him. In baseball it might be the #3 hitter driving in the #2 hitter and in football it might be the wide receiver catching a touchdown from his quarterback. For hockey, when a player scores it's likely at least one other player on the ice is going to pick up an assist. Rostering multiple players from the same team who are going to be on the ice together frequently, or the NHL's version of stacking, is how you can achieve correlation.
   
3. Know the lines and power-play units. If you're new to the game, this will be a bit difficult as you won't have them memorized. Luckily you can use our Line Tools to review past game lines or other sites like Daily Faceoff which list anticipated lines and power-play units. From there you can build correlated team stacks. Combining two to three different team stacks per lineup to form a 4-3-1, 4-2-2, or 3-3-2 stack with your eight skater roster spots are frequent lineup builds you will see used by the top NHL DFS players. 
   
4. Confirm your goalie. Teams like to try and limit their goalie's workloads when possible, particularly in a condensed season like this. As a result, most teams are rotating two goalies. You'll obviously want to make sure you have the one who is actually starting in your lineup. Our Goalie Post tool is a great way to check this and is updated throughout the day.

Now that you got the basics, all that's left is picking the right players. Hopefully I can help point you in the right direction. There are eight games on the main slate for Saturday and it's a unique one because four of those eight games are a rematch from Friday night. This many back-to-backs are something we don't see very often, so admittedly it makes writing this article in advance a bit more difficult. You'll want to pay extra close attention to goalies as many teams will want to avoid starting the same goalie on a back-to-back. If there's any late injury news or line changes from Friday that impacts Saturday, I'll be sure to tweet an update during the day Saturday. You can follow me on Twitter @SteveDotzel to see these updates.

Now let's get to it. All players and prices are from DraftKings Main Slate (7 pm EST) but can be applied to FanDuel as well.

Top Options

TOR – Auston Matthews ($9,200), Mitch Marner ($7,600), Joe Thornton ($4,000)

I may sound like a bit of a broken record writing up Matthews and company every week in this article, but it's tough to ignore someone having the season he's having. The matchup against Vancouver only fuels this. They were able to keep Matthews in check in Thursday's meeting, but even so he racked up five shots to achieve the bonus and missed a wide-open net in the final minutes. On the year he's scored 18 goals in 22 games played, and the fact he now has gone four straight games without a goal signals to me another is coming very shortly.

Marner and Thornton skate with Matthews at even strength and the power play, making both great stacking options to pair with him. Thornton in particular is much cheaper and helps to offset the hefty cost associated with Matthews. Matthews will be the highest-owned player on the slate, so if he goes off and you don't have him, you're going to be in a world of hurt. Of course, with such a high price tag and ownership that also opens door for a strong tournament fade if you have the guts. I'd expect Matthews to come in around 40% ownership, so I'd suggest building multiple lineups and taking a stand and play him in around 20% or 60% of your lineups depending if you want to go overweight or underweight the field.

VGK – Max Pacioretty ($7,800), Mark Stone ($6,100), Shea Theodore ($5,900), Chandler Stephenson ($4,300)

The Sharks, who Vegas will be playing tonight, are having major issues keeping pucks out of the net. They had allowed at least four goals in four of the five games leading up to Friday and now trail only Ottawa in goals allowed per game on the season. The Golden Knights top scoring option is Pacioretty and when he's joined by Stone, they form a lethal duo. Pacioretty is one of the league's most prolific shooters, having racked up 35 shots across the past seven games. This five-shot-per-game average puts him firmly in play for the bonus every night.

With five goals in that stretch, lighting the lamp is very well within the realm of possibilities and Pacioretty has recently flashed his potential with a 40 DraftKings point showing on Monday. Stone makes for a great stacking partner as evidenced by his seven assists in the last three games alone. As for the third member of this stack, I prefer to forego Stephenson in favor of Theodore but don't have any issues rostering Stephenson if the salary relief is needed.  

EDM – Connor McDavid ($9,100), Jesse Puljujarvi ($4,200), Ryan Nugent-Hopkins ($7,000), Leon Draisaitl ($8,000)

If you're passing on paying up for Matthews, the next logical options bring you to Edmonton's star duo of McDavid and Draisaitl. The Oilers will be ecstatic to see someone besides Toronto after only mustering one goal in three games against them this week. A three-game scoring drought is rare air for McDavid, which is what he finds himself in currently. The Flames come into Saturday having just fired their coach after allowing 17 goals in four games to Ottawa. The last time these two teams met back on February 20^th the Oilers exploded for seven goals and in seven meetings between these two teams across the past two seasons there have been a whopping 51 goals scored.

You'll want to keep an eye on the lines Saturday as it's typical to see things changed around when a team has a scoring drought like Edmonton is currently in. With that said, Puljujarvi should be on McDavid's wing and his price tag is very affordable. On the other side is likely to be Nugent-Hopkins who is the preferred option but also has the much higher salary. The Draisaitl line is firmly in play as well and is much cheaper but regardless of lines a power play stack of simply McDavid, Draisaitl, and Nugent-Hopkins is a great way to capture a majority of the would be scoring if you can afford it.   

COL – Nazem Kadri ($5,700), Andre Burakovsky ($3,800), Brandon Saad ($3,400)

I won't fault you for rostering the Avalanche top line, which I'd expect to once again include Nathan MacKinnon ($8,900), but given the price tags on many of the guys I've already talked about we are going to need some cheaper lines to stack to be able to afford those high-priced options. One of my favorites tonight is the second line of Colorado. Kadri himself is a good value as he has a secure role on the top power play and he's used that to score at least 12 DraftKings points in six of the past eight games entering Friday. Plus if MacKinnon were to miss a second straight game, Kadri will slide up to the first line.

Entering Friday's actions both of Kadri's typical linemates had been in a scoring funk with Saad and Burakovsky combining for just two goals since the calendar flipped to February. However, they seem to be showing signs of coming out of that slump. Burakovsky has had four points in the past five games and Saad had three just last night. If you want to extend the stack even further consider Samuel Girard or Devon Toews at defenseman. Girard joins Kadri on the top power play and Toews is with Burakovsky and Saad on the second unit.

Quick Hitters

VGK2 – While the top line is the preferred play, the second line of William Karlsson ($4,800), Jonathan Marchessault ($4,600), and Reilly Smith ($3,500) come in at a very affordable price tag and have the same A+ matchup against the Sharks. Karlsson and Marchessault have scored six goals in the teams previous four games entering Friday.

MIN2 – The Wild's hot run after returning from a lengthy Covid absence was spelled by the Golden Knights this week, so a change of scenery could be just what they need to get going again. During that stretch which saw the Wild win six straight, the second line of Mats Zuccarello ($5,500), Kirill Kaprizov ($4,400), and Victor Rask ($3,400) did most of the damage. They're reasonably priced and I like going back to them tonight. Rask can be left off but you definitely want at least Zuccarello and Kaprizov together.

TOR2 – The hottest Maple Leaf of late has actually been William Nylander ($5,300) who's scored five goals in the past five games while averaging over 16 DraftKings points per. Pairing him with John Tavares ($6,800) is a good way to get Toronto exposure and pivot off the Matthews chalk simultaneously.

LA1 – I really liked this matchup for the Kings Friday night against Ville Husso, but they couldn't quite finish the game off, eventually falling in overtime. The matchup against Binnington Saturday is a bit tougher on paper, but I'm going back to the well again tonight. You just don't get many top lines fully correlated on the power play for under $15,500 combined salary. Feel free to add on Drew Doughty ($5,100) at defenseman as well who shares plenty of time with this trio.

Top Value Options for Filling Out Lineups:

C – Gabriel Vilardi ($3,800), Cody Glass ($3,700), Adam Henrique ($3,600), Jesperi Kotkaniemi ($2,900)

W – Alex Tuch ($4,300), Andrew Mangiapane ($4,000), Andreas Athanasiou ($3,100), Joonas Donskoi ($3,100)

D – Erik Karlsson ($3,800), Vince Dunn ($3,100), Jacob MacDonald ($2,800), Noah Hanifin ($2,600)

Goalie Picks

Frederik Andersen ($8,200)

Marc-Andre Fleury ($8,400)

Adin Hill ($7,200)

Jordan Binnington ($7,800)

Connor Hellebuyck ($7,200)

Be sure to double check your lineups before lock for any last-minute scratches or goalie changes, especially this year with the Covid protocols. If you follow me on Twitter @SteveDotzel you can subscribe to my "DFS-NHL" list which is comprised of several team beat writers tweeting the most recent news in real-time. You can also reach out to me personally and I'll do my best to answer any questions I can. Hope to see you on top of the leaderboards!