Toronto Maple Leafs vs Seattle Kraken 1/5/23 NHL Picks, Predictions, Odds

The Seattle Kraken and the Toronto Maple Leafs meet in NHL action from the Scotiabank Arena on Thursday night.

The Seattle Kraken will look to build on a 5-2 win over Edmonton in their last game. Andre Burakovsky leads Seattle in scoring with 28 points including a team-high 18 assists while Jordan Eberle has 27 points with 8 goals and 19 assists and Matty Beniers has 27 points with 12 goals and 15 assists. Jared McCann also has a team-high 17 goals this season for Seattle. Martin Jones has gone 16-5-3 with a 2.92 GAA and an .890 save percentage while Philipp Grubauer is 3-7-1 with a 3.53 GAA and an .881 save percentage in goal for Seattle this season.

The Toronto Maple Leafs will try to bounce back from a 6-5 shootout loss to St. Louis in their last game. Mitch Marner leads the Leafs with 43 points including a team-high 29 assists while John Tavares has 34 points including 15 goals. Auston Matthews has 44 points with 19 goals and 25 assists and William Nylander has 45 points with a team-high 22 goals and 23 assists this season. Ilya Samsonov’s 11-3-1 with a 2.38 GAA and a .914 save percentage while Matt Murray is 9-3-2 with a 2.44 GAA and a .920 save percentage in goal for Toronto so far this season.

Seattle is 2-5 in their last 7 games against the Eastern Conference and 4-1 in their last 5 games against a team with a winning record while the over is 4-1 in their last 5 road games. Toronto is 44-16 in their last 60 home games and 6-2 in their last 8 games against a team with a winning record while the over is 5-0 in their last 5 games overall.

I get the case to be made for an underdog like Seattle, but Toronto’s the better team here and the goaltending always seems to step it up when the Leafs are at home. The Kraken were on a nice run but have stumbled a bit lately and I just think it’s time we hop back on Toronto. Give me Toronto big here.