Back-to-Back for San Jose
The Sharks are in a back-to-back situation as they played on Thursday night in Tampa Bay against the Lightning. This is the fourth game of a brutally long nine-game road trip for the Sharks. San Jose has been a solid road team this season so even though they are playing with no rest you can make a case for taking San Jose on Friday night. The Sharks are one of a select few teams in the NHL that ranks in the top 10 in both goals for and in fewest goals against.
Hurricanes 14-15 at Home
The Hurricanes have the advantage of rest on Friday night as they have not played since Monday when they won at Montreal. Carolina has been nothing special at home though as they actually have a losing record. It is really hard to make a case for Carolina as they are not likely to make the playoffs and they may start unloading players at the trading deadline.
Ruutu Out
The Hurricanes will be without leading scorer Tuomo Ruutu for this game as he has an upper body injury and will miss the next few weeks. Ruutu lead the team with 17 goals this season and was rumored to be on the trading block as he is an unrestricted free agent after this season. Carolina has to decide whether to trade Ruutu or sign him to a contract extension.
Game Trends
The Sharks and Hurricanes have split their last ten games and it has very much been a road team series. In fact, the road team has won the past three meetings going back to 2009. The last five games in the series have gone over the total.
NHL Predictions
Even though this is a tough travel spot for San Jose we have to go with the Sharks as they are simply the better team. We’ll also stick with the trends and take the game over the total.
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