BetSharpr

Confidence is the model's own chance that the side we picked wins. It weighs each team's roster, the starting goalies, injuries, rest and travel, and home ice. Each pick follows our model, starting goalie included, until puck drop, and the pick at puck drop is the one that counts. A game becomes a top pick only when the model's confidence reaches 60% - at most 4 a night, ranked by confidence, and a night with none is normal (through Oct 7, the surest 2 locked at noon as top picks), and only those count toward the record. In each game's table, a goalie is hot when he has saved .925 or better over his last 5 starts and cold at .880 or worse (league average is about .900). Hot scorers have a goal in 3 straight games, 3 goals in their last 5, or 6 in their last 10. Early in the season, recent numbers include the end of last season. The projected score is the model's expected goals for each team, and the win chance is the model's own (overtime included). Each game has up to three separate reads from that one projected score: the winner, the puck line and the total, the last two compared with the posted number when one is out and locked with the pick at puck drop. Puck-line and total chances come from how far hockey results scatter around a projection, read straight off that curve so the three chances always agree with each other; those two reads have no track record of beating the posted numbers yet. Goal-scorer props: the chance a player scores, from his shots per game and how often those shots go in (leaned on the league rate until the sample is big), the opponent's goals allowed and home ice. Checked against a full season of results before use. Only props locked before puck drop count.