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Jeremy Perry
Edmonton Oilers vs. Arizona Coyotes: Odds, Prediction
The Oilers will visit the Arizona Coyotes on Friday night, who are just 3-9-2 over its last 14 games. While the game doesn’t mean much in the standings, is there any value for bettors?
Oilers vs Coyotes Betting Analysis
Arizona has been the worst team in the Western Conference to bet on this season. If you’ve been backing them this season, you’re down -20.5 units. They haven’t shown much resolve at home where they are 5-13-2 this season. Edmonton hasn’t been much better, costing bettors -13.8 units on the year.
The stats don’t look good either way. The Coyotes are 1-9 against their division this year and 4-12 against teams with a losing record. The Oilers are 6-10 against teams with a losing record and have lost four of their last five in Arizona.
Edmonton Oilers
Edmonton has dropped three in a row and seven of their last eight overall. They have been outscored 11-3 in the first three games of a five-game road trip, which isn’t a surprise. They’ve struggled to keep pucks out of their net all season. Now their own lack of goal scoring has caught up to them as they have looked absolutely terrible at both ends of the ice. Connor McDavid has three points in his last four games and leads the Oilers with 48 points this season. However, he hasn’t received much support from his fellow forwards.
Milan Lucic, Ryan Strome, Michael Cammalleri and Patrick Maroon have all been held without a goal over the past two weeks. Until the depth forwards on Edmonton’s roster begin to produce they will struggle to win games. Meanwhile, Cam Talbot has struggled in between the pipes for the Oilers. Talbot is 1-5-0 with a 3.87 goals-against average and an .883 save percentage since December 31st. Talbot will need to perform better in order to help Edmonton break out of its recent funk.
Arizona Coyotes
The Coyotes have done a better job competing of late. They are 3-3-1 in their last seven, which is quite positive for a team that had just three wins in their first 21 games. They’ve looked particularly sharp in their last two games. After beating the Nashville Predators 3-2 in overtime, Arizona took the New York Rangers to a shootout before losing 2-1 in its last outing. Antti Raanta has just two wins in his last nine starts for the Coyotes but he has allowed just three goals in the last 64 shots he’s faced.
Meanwhile, Derek Stepan has led the way up front of late with four assists in his last four games. The offense has produced 2.57 goals per game over their last seven. While that doesn’t seem like much, the team scored 2.15 goals per game in December (29th in the NHL) and 2.13 in November (30th). This is a notable improvement for them.
