LA Kings vs Tampa Bay Lightning projected lineup, betting preview

After a 3-2 road trip, the LA Kings are back home on Tuesday night, playing host to the Tampa Bay Lightning in their first of three straight games at Crypto.com Arena.

Projected Lineups

LA Kings (3-4)

Kempe – Kopitar – Fiala
Moore – Danault – Arvidsson
Kaliyev – Byfield – Vilardi
Lemieux – Lizotte – Grundstrom

Anderson – Doughty
Durzi – Roy
Edler – Clarke

Quick
Petersen

Back in LA, I don’t anticipate any changes to the Kings’ lineup from their game in Washington on Saturday. We saw the return of Alexander Edler, and, at least in my opinion, Sean Durzi as LD2 and Brand Clarke as LD3 are still better options than Sean Walker.

Jonathan Quick was great through 40 minutes against the Capitals. The final 20 didn’t go so well, allowing four goals on 17 shots. That said, I expect he gets the nod against the Lightning.

Tampa Bay Lightning (3-3)

Here’s how the visitors skated on Monday:

#GoBolts practice lines and pairings:

Hagel-Point-Kucherov
Killorn-Stamkos-Namestnikov
Colton-Paul-Koepke
Maroon-Bellemare-Perry

Hedman-Cernak
Sergachev-Perbix
Cole-Foote
Fleury-Myers

— Eduardo A. Encina (@EddieInTheYard) October 24, 2022

While the Kings are coming off two-straight losses, Tamp Bay are winners of two in a row. The usual suspects continue to do the job for the Lightning as Steven Stamkos (7G + 2A), Nikita Kucherov (0G + 8A), and Brayden Point (4G + 2A) are all at least point-per-game players through the team’s first six games.

This will be the second set of back-to-back games for the Lightning. Brian Elliott started the second leg this past weekend, so Andrei Vasilevskiy should be between the pipes on Tuesday.

As always, keep an eye on lineup changes and updates from morning skates.

5-on-5

Here’s how the two teams match up at 5-on-5 per Natural Stat Trick

Imagine that, a Kings team being held together by strong finishing – who knew? Their 16 goals at 5-on-5 come off of 12.8 expected goals.

As a team, LA has yet to find its structure in the early going. With being back home, the hope will be that they’re able to get some more practice time in and get settled into the stable system that’s made them a strong possession team during Todd McLellan‘s tenure.

Tampa Bay is coming off a game where they were dominated at 5-on-5 (37.4% CF%, 39.0% xGF%) against the New York Islanders. Currently, they’re a middle-of-the-pack team in terms of possession. Overall, it’s been a relatively subpar start for the reigning Eastern Conference Champions.

Special Teams

LA’s power play has struggled out of the gate, going just 5-for-33 (15.2%, 22nd in the NHL) with the man advantage. Only Kevin Fiala, Anze Kopitar, and Drew Doughty have tallied multiple power play points for the Kings – each has two.

Shifting to the penalty kill, it’s been better in Los Angeles, but 71.8% still isn’t quite where the team would like to be. They’ve allowed seven goals on 32 attempts.

The Lightning has one of the league’s top power plays, clicking at 28% (9th in the NHL) to start the season. One of the league’s most lethal shooters, Steven Stamkos, leads the league in power play goals with five.

Tampa Bay’s penalty kill sits at 81.8%, good for 14th in the league.

Betting Odds

Let’s take a look at the odds, courtesy of our partner Betstamp (promo code: hockeyroyalty).

*Note: the odds below are for sports books offered in New York. Refer to available sports books specific to your state.
**Odds as of 8:30 am ET/5:30 am PT and may have changed since this has been published.

The LA Kings are slight home underdogs on Tuesday night, with BetRivers offering the best odds at +112. Tampa Bay comes in at a -125 favorite at BetMGM. 

The total on this game is 6.5, and despite having one of the best goalies in the NHL, the Lightning has allowed 13 goals at 5-on-5, the seventh most in the NHL. This is due in large part to them being a bottom-ten team in allowing scoring chances and a bottom-half team in allowing high-danger chances. Both of those are things LA has really struggled with this year. The Kings are bottom-five in scoring chances allowed and bottom-ten in high-danger chances allowed. I’ve been a broken record with this, but barely league-average penalty killing, poor defense, and poor goaltending are not going to bode well for the hosts against a high-powered offense like Tampa Bay.

If you like the Over, BetRivers is the best book to place your wager at -105. For Under bettors, there are currently multiple books offering -110.

The Lightning’s Team Total is 2.5, with Caesars offering -179 on the Over. The Kings have allowed four goals or more in six of their seven games.

DraftKings Player Props

Sponsored by DraftKings (promo code THPN)

The line of Trevor Moore, Phillip Danault, and Viktor Arvidsson might be hitting their stride. They’ve looked more dangerous the past few games and coming off a game in Washington where they combined for two goals and four assists. Danault (+100) and Moore (+105) are Even money or better to record a point, while Arvidsson (-105) also looks attractive.

LA’s power play has not looked good, but the second unit has shown to be more dangerous in recent games. Arthur Kaliyev has been able to get one-timers off from the right circle that just haven’t found the net yet. His three shots on goal with the man advantage against Pittsburgh led the team, and he has seven shots on 13 attempts in 14:13 of power play time this season. He is +425 to record a power play point.

For the visitors, Alex Killorn is off to a bit of a slow start (1G, 2A), but playing on a line with Stamkos and Vladislav Namestnikov, along with getting second-unit power play time, I like his chances to record a point tonight (+105) against porous Kings defense.

Good luck, and enjoy the game!

Follow me on Betstamp @JWPatarino!