Join Canada Sports Betting’s Nick Martin as he handicaps the best player prop bets and top betting picks available from Friday’s four-game Olympic men’s hockey slate.
We got off to a solid start to our Olympic player prop guides Thursday, as we split our selections, but cashed Tage Thompson to score at a long price of +160. These player prop guides are now up 17.25 units across 117 selections this season. Hopefully we can keep rolling Friday, and I’m excited to outline my two favourites from Friday’s games in this piece.
Juraj Slafkovsky To Score: -107
Slafkovsky to score
Slafkovsky solidified himself as the number-one overall pick with seven goals in seven games for Slovakia, powering the team to a gold medal on the international stage at age 17. NHLers weren’t at that tournament, which obviously benefited Slafkovsky’s production, but in a tough opening matchup versus Finland, Slafkovsky stole the show with two goals and an assist.
On Friday, Slafkovsky will face an Italian side that is more on par with the kind of teams that he faced in the previous Olympics when NHLers were not involved.
Italy surprised in hanging around with Sweden in its opener, as the game was still deadlocked at two late in the second period. However, Italy allowed 59 shots on goal including a ton of high-quality scoring chances versus Sweden, and while it was a lovable story, the game could have gotten way more out of hand.
I’m not convinced that Italy’s performance is indicative that they are not far, far below most of the teams in this competition. That point may be especially true if goaltender Damian Clara is unable to play in this game after he left the opener early due to injury.
Sweden’s top line generated scoring chances at will on Wednesday, and though Tomas Tatar, Slafkovsky, and Adam Ruzicka is not as formidable of a unit, it still seems likely that they will dominate in this soft matchup.
While this year’s competition is stiffer than Slafkovsky saw at the Olympics in 2022, his game has come a long way since that point. His awareness and game sense are far better now; his finishing touch has improved. It seems logical to expect the Slovaks to follow up their upset win with a strong showing in this matchup, and I’m expecting Slafkovsky to lead the way.
Connor McDavid Over 1.5 Total Points: -105
McDavid over 1.5 points
In my game guide for Canada’s matchup against Switzerland, I selected McDavid to score as my best bet at -106. In the time since that piece was written, bet365 has added player points to their list of player props, and I’m happy to now outline McDavid to record two points.
McDavid was without question the best skater on the ice in Thursday’s game. He was assertive in driving to the net to open plays up, attempted over 10 shots on goal and finished with three assists.
Canada’s top line of McDavid, Macklin Celebrini, and Tom Wilson showed strong chemistry throughout the game. Wilson did a good job of winning puck battles down low and making short, simple passes to make sure McDavid and Celebrini got as many touches as possible, and the two looked every bit as dynamic as expected.
Canada’s top power-play unit looked like a cheat code, just as it did throughout much of the 4 Nations Face-Off. That seems unlikely to change, and McDavid should have a good chance of padding his stats on what could be one of the greatest power play units in the history of the sport.
McDavid led all Canadian skaters with 18:04 of time-on-ice in the opener. While some tremendous forwards are going to play way less minutes than they are used to in this tournament, that likely will not apply to the game’s best player.
McDavid has put up 60 points over his last 31 NHL games. Prices for him to record over 1.5 points have often been in the -140 range recently. Switzerland is a competitive side, but still do not project to be a tougher matchup than McDavid faces on average in the NHL. With that in mind, a price of -105 for two points seems to be quite a discount, considering McDavid’s usage doesn’t seem likely to drop all that much compared to what it is with the Edmonton Oilers.
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