Montreal Canadiens vs. Chicago Blackhawks Prediction, NHL Odds
The Blackhawks are rare favourites at -115 on the NHL odds.
Canadiens vs. Blackhawks NHL Betting Odds
It’s the final game before the holiday mini-break for Montreal, but Chicago plays again on a very busy Saturday. Sometimes, a team simply has to get lucky in terms of the quality of a draft class when said team holds the No. 1 overall pick in the NHL Draft.
North Vancouver native Connor Bedard was considered one of the great prospects to enter the league in years and has largely lived up to it. He was a no-doubt No. 1 overall pick this year by Chicago. The 2023 draft class was considered excellent at the top with Bedard, Leo Carlsson (No. 2 to Anaheim) and Adam Fantilli (third to Columbus).
Montreal picked first overall in 2022 and that class was not considered all that strong, and it has shown with No. 1 overall pick Juraj Slafkovsky. He’s still only 19 but has disappointed thus far with just 10 points in 39 games last season and 10 in 32 this year.
This concludes the season series between the teams as the Habs played their home opener on Oct. 14 vs. Chicago and won 3-2. Montreal scored all three goals in the second period with Chicago getting two from Tyler Johnson in the third to make it interesting. Bedard was booed every time he touched the puck at Bell Centre.
Montreal Canadiens
Montreal had at two-game winning streak snapped in a 4-3 OT loss in Minnesota on Thursday. Very tough defeat considering Montreal rallied from down 2-0 in the first and 3-2 in the third with Juraj Slafkovsky tying it at 16:57 of the third with his third goal of the season. The Wild won it with only five seconds left in OT. David Savard (second goal of season) and Nick Suzuki (ninth) also scored for Montreal. It was Sam Montembeault in net so it should be Jake Allen on Friday. He stopped 30 of 32 shots in a 3-2 overtime win over Winnipeg on Monday to earn his first win since Oct. 28 after going 0-6-1 with a 4.22 GAA and .881 save per centage over his previous seven appearances. Montreal is 4-10 in its past 14 vs. the Western Conference.
Chicago Blackhawks
Chicago snapped a four-game skid with a fairly sizable home upset of Colorado on Tuesday, 3-2, although the Avs were missing a couple of key players. Just getting to three goals is notable for the Hawks, who rank second-to-last in the league in scoring at 2.35 goals per game. Ryan Donato (fifth of season), Lukas Reichel (third) and Tyler Johnson (seventh) had the goals. Connor Bedard had two assists, the third time in the past five he has had two in a game. He leads the club with 12 goals and 16 assists but is minus-13. Defenceman Kevin Korchinski, the No. 7 overall pick in the 2022 draft, has missed the last six games due to the death of his father but has been practicing and could play. He has two goals and five assists in 25 games and is considered a building block. Petr Mrazek stopped 35 of 37 shots to improve to 8-10-0 with a 3.04 GAA and a .909 save per centage on Tuesday. Mrazek has been much better than No. 2 Arvid Soderblom (2-10-1, 4.00, .872) but because this is the front end of a back-to-back, it could be Soderblom. Our pick will be as if it’s Mrazek.