Boston Bruins (37-18-5) vs. Minnesota Wild (34-20-4)
March 16, 2022 7:30 pm EDT
The Line: Minnesota Wild -120 / Boston Bruins +100; Over/Under: +6
(Get latest betting odds)
The Boston Bruins and the Minnesota Wild meet in NHL action from the Xcel Energy Center on Wednesday night.
The Boston Bruins will look to build on three straight wins after a 2-1 OT win over Chicago last time out. David Pastrnak leads the Bruins in scoring with 61 points while Brad Marchand is right behind with 58 points, with Marchand logging 23 goals and a team-high 35 assists while Pastrnak has a team-high 33 goals and 28 assists and Patrice Bergeron has 45 points with 17 goals and 28 assists as well. Taylor Hall and Charlie McAvoy have a combined 62 assists while Matt Grzelcyk’s posting a team-high +15 plus/minus rating as well this season. Linus Ullmark’s posted an 18-9-2 mark with a 2.81 GAA and a .908 save percentage between the pipes for the Bruins while Jeremy Swayman is 17-7-3 with a 2.06 GAA and a .926 save percentage this season.
The Minnesota Wild will look to build on back-to-back losses after a 6-2 loss to Nashville last time out. Kirill Kaprizov leads the Wild in scoring with 73 points including team-highs of 30 goals and 43 assists while Mats Zuccarello has 60 points with 19 goals and 41 assists. Kevin Fiala has 54 points while Ryan Hartman has 43 points with 23 goals and Marcus Foligno has 19 goals as well this season. Cam Talbot’s gone 22-12-1 with a 3.00 GAA and a .906 save percentage for Winnipeg this season while Kaapo Kahkonen has gone 12-8-3 with a 2.87 GAA and a .910 save percentage this season.
Boston is 7-1 in their last 8 road games and 6-1 in their last 7 games after allowing 2 goals or less in their previous game while the over is 4-0 in their last 4 games in the fourth game of a four game in six night situation. Minnesota is 37-14 in their last 51 home games and 3-8 in their last 11 games overall while the over is 24-3 in their last 27 games as a home favorite.
I get that Minnesota being favored because they’re at home makes sense, but the reality here is that Boston is simply playing the far better hockey between these two teams right now, and by a fair margin at that. Home ice will only get you so far when there’s this much of a gap in form between these two so give me Boston in this one.
