NHL Stanley Cup Playoffs Eastern Conference Best Bets 5/5/22

The President’s Trophy-winning Florida Panthers were upset in Game 1 against the Washington Capitals but will look to get on the board tonight at home.

Below, you can look at both Eastern Conference games on tonight’s NHL slate and at some of our best bets on the FanDuel Sportsbook.

The Penguins and Rangers played on Tuesday to triple-overtime that ended thanks to an Evgeni Malkin goal that gave the Penguins a 4-3 Game 1 victory. In one of the longest games in recent memory, the Penguins outshot the Rangers 83-68, but there was even more drama as Casey DeSmith had to leave the contest in the middle of the second overtime before Louis Domingue entered and stopped all 17 shots to pick up the win.

DeSmith’s status ahead of this Game 2 is in question and the Penguins are already without their number one goalie in Tristian Jarry, so this situation is certainly worth keeping an eye on. Even though the Rangers were unable to muster up a Game 1 victory at home, their odds as favorites on the moneyline have actually increased ahead of this Game 2 from Game 1 and they’ll look to head to Pittsburgh with the series all tied up. It’s unlikely we see another marathon game as we did in Game 1, but the Rangers should bounce back tonight and we’ll likely see plenty of goals scored in them doing so.

Best Bets: Rangers ML -160, O5.5 -125

The Capitals stunned the Panthers in Game 1 by a score of 4-2 to take a 1-0 series lead, where Vitek Vanecek stopped 30 of 32 shots in net, while TJ Oshie scored the game-winner.

This Capitals team is certainly a veteran squad and that could pay dividends for them against an up-and-coming Panthers team that really doesn’t have a ton of playoff experience. Even though the Capitals outshot the Panthers, for a lot of that game, you could see the Carolina offense coming together, but struggling to actually score. That feels like some playoff nerves and those should be less of a factor as we shift to Game 2 tonight.

This Panthers team was the highest-scoring offense in the NHL this season for a reason and it’s difficult to see them not finding a way to score plenty of goals in Game 2 tonight. Even though the Panthers didn’t put on an eye-opening performance in Game 1 like a lot of people expected they would look for them to win tonight by multiple goals, meaning you should look towards Florida on the puckline at +100.

Best Bets: Panthers puckline (-1.5) +100