NHL All-Star Game Picks

While the rest of the country is dealing with cold temperatures in early February, the NHL will be heading to South Florida for the 2023 NHL All-Star Game. Many players and media members are happy for the reprieve in warm weather, and they will descend on Sunrise, Florida (home of the Florida Panthers) for this week’s events. There will be an NHL All-Star Skills Competition on Friday night before the NHL All-Star Game gets underway on Saturday. In the past this was an actual All-Star Game, but it is now a miniature tournament as there are four teams instead of two teams. Rather than this being simply Eastern Conference vs. Western Conference, there are teams representing the Atlantic Division, Metropolitan Division, Central Division, and Pacific Division.

NHL All-Star Game Betting Odds at BetRivers Sportsbook

Check Back Later

NHL All-Star Game Preview

Atlantic Division All-Stars

It’s likely that the Atlantic Division All-Stars will be the favorites per the NHL betting odds to win the All-Star Game. The Boston Bruins have the best record in the league, and this division also has the Toronto Maple Leafs and the Tampa Bay Lightning.

Linus Ullmark and Andrei Vasilevskiy are the best goaltending tandem at the All-Star Game. Ullmark has the best numbers of any goaltender this season, and Vasilevskiy has been the best goaltender in the league for three straight years. There are some great scoring options within this division too as players like Nikita Kucherov, Mitch Marner, and David Pastrnak can all light the lamp. Unfortunately, Auston Matthews will have to miss the festivities due to injury, and he will be replaced by Aleksander Barkov.

Metropolitan Division All-Stars

This might be the team that is the least likely to win the All-Star Game. Fan favorites like Sidney Crosby and Alex Ovechkin are on the roster, but they are not nearly the elite players they were in the past. Jack Hughes is having a fine season and is in the prime of his career, but there are plenty of concerns about the viability of this roster.

Additionally, Igor Shesterkin and Ilya Sorokin have not been as great as they were last year. Shesterkin has come back down to Earth after a great 2021-22 campaign, while Sorokin has had some good games at times. This team might be the most wagered on side during the NHL All-Star Game since they largely represent populated Northeastern United States.

Central Division All-Stars

The defending Stanley Cup champions have three players on the Central Division All-Stars. Colorado hasn’t had Gabriel Landeskog the whole year due to injury, but Nathan MacKinnon, Mikko Rantanen, and Cale Makar have played like All-Stars. This team has something of an advantage too because it has three defensemen on the roster. Seth Jones and Josh Morrissey will join Makar along the blue line, and that can really come in handy in the three-on-three format of these games.

Juuse Saros is still a very good goaltender, and Connor Hellebuyck can get hot as a back-up. There are a few other players that can dump in goals in bunches, making this a potential darkhorse team.

Pacific Division All-Stars

The presence of Connor McDavid and Leon Draisaitl means that there will be goals. McDavid is running away with the Hart Trophy race, while Draisaitl is currently a distant second. However, there aren’t a lot of other offensive weapons here, and Bo Horvat probably won’t be too motivated after being traded from Vancouver to the New York Islanders earlier this week.

To make matters worse, the goaltending on this team is clearly the worst of all four divisions. Logan Thompson and Stuart Skinner are not great goaltenders, and there isn’t a good blue line. They may play some of the highest scoring games by the NHL betting odds, but they won’t be able to get a win.

Verdict

If you are going to bet on two teams to win the All-Star Game, the Atlantic Division and Central Division are the choices. We should see odds on NHL betting open in the next few days.