Locky’s First Period NHL Model, 3/19: A Good Reason to Watch Panthers-Stars

Good morning!

After a couple days off, which allowed me to really grind on some NCAA tournament data-gathering, the model is back for a busy Tuesday.

There are 10 games on the slate, and although Chicago won't be discussed because they aren't playing, a lot of the teams we've gotten real friendly with are back.

A Reminder

If you’re new here, I built a model to handicap first-period over/unders in the NHL.

To provide the greatest value to you the bettor, each of these articles will include a downloadable Excel file at the bottom. In it, you can insert the line at your sportsbook of choice and see the bets that are — and aren’t — offering value, according to my model.

Florida Panthers at Dallas Stars, 8:30 p.m. ET

The largest edge on the slate is, not surprisingly I guess, the Dallas under. This is for a few reasons: first off, Dallas unders have now come back to Earth in terms of market-pricing, and this one opened -125.

We had seen -140, and even -160 a few times the last couple weeks when there was a Blackhawk-like hysteria around the market.

The other reason this under is appealing is Dallas is playing another one of our very low-scoring first period teams, Florida.

The Panthers have only allowed 22% of their goals in the first period, which is the lowest mark in the entire league. They allow plenty of goals overall, just not in the first.

The match-up of these two statistical profiles is creating this edge.

Locky’s First-Period NHL Over/Unders: Full Slate Projections

Download the Excel doc to input odds from your sportsbooks. The table below is best viewed on a desktop computer.