The Colorado Avalanche are 9-1 over their last 10 games, including a current winning streak of four straight games. The Avalanche will look to extend that winning streak in a two-game set against the Los Angeles Kings that starts Friday night in Colorado.
- Date/Time: April 16, 9 p.m. ET
- Arena: Ball Arena
- TV Coverage: ESPN+
- Sportsbook Odds: Avalanche -295 | O/U 5.5 (Line History)
- Kings vs Avalanche Matchup Report
Sportsbook Odds Analysis
Early bettors were not scared away by the heavy price on the Avalanche as -295 favorites, taking the chalk and driving the line up to Colorado -300. The Kings will try to pull off the upset as +250 road underdogs while the total has been bumped up to 6 goals since Sportsbook at 5.5 goals. Six of the last seven games between Los Angeles and Colorado have gone UNDER the posted total.
Los Angeles News & Notes
The Kings strung together six straight wins back in February to improve to 9-6-3 on the season, giving their fans some hope that the rebuild might be ahead of schedule. But Los Angeles is just 7-14-3 since then with a brutal 3-9-0 stretch over its last 12 games. The front office kept its focus on the future at the trade deadline, dealing away veteran center Jeff Carter to the Pittsburgh Penguins for two conditional draft picks.
Los Angeles has taken strides forward on both offense and defense from last season’s 29-35-6 campaign. The Kings have a solid young core on offense that includes Alex Iafallo, Adrian Kempe, Trevor Moore and Gabriel Vilardi, but Anze Kopitar is still the clear star of this attack. The team’s veteran captain has nine goals and 34 assists in 42 games this season.
Colorado News & Notes
Mikko Rantanen scored a goal and added an assist in Colorado’s 4-3 win over the St. Louis Blues on Wednesday night. Rantanen has scored five goals in Colorado’s last five games and is second only to Auston Matthews in goals league-wide this season with 26. And the 24-year-old isn’t even the team’s leader in points as his 52 points is one behind Nathan MacKinnon’s 53 (17 goals, 36 assists).
The Avalanche have the best record in the NHL at 30-9-4 and have only one regulation loss in their last 20 games. They rank best in the league on offense by averaging 3.58 goals per game and are second-best in goals against, allowing only 2.33 goals per game. Colorado and the Vegas Golden Knights are a clear step above the rest of the West Division and seem to be on a collision course in the upcoming postseason.
Betting Pick: Colorado -300
Colorado would have to play an uncharacteristically bad game to lose to the struggling Kings at home. Unfortunately for Los Angeles, the Avalanche lost to the Minnesota Wild 8-3 last week; that loss is still probably too fresh for Colorado to get caught sleeping again here.
- Los Angeles is 2-4 in its last 6 games vs Colorado.
- Colorado is 18-4-2 in 24 home games this season.
- The OVER is 12-5 in Colorado’s last 17 games.
