The Vegas Golden Knights will play in the Western Conference semifinals for the fourth time in their six years as a franchise.
This time, they will take on the Dallas Stars, who they also faced in the Conference Finals back in the 2019-20 season. The Stars went on to win that series in five games before eventually falling to the Tampa Bay Lightning in the Stanley Cup Final.
Will the Stars get the better of the Golden Knights once again or will Vegas advance to its second Stanley Cup Final in franchise history?
Let's dive into the odds for the Western Conference Final and then I'll give you my prediction.
Golden Knights vs. Stars series odds
Golden Knights vs. Stars series prediction
Before the playoffs begun, I picked the Stars to win the Western Conference, so I'm going to stick to that pick and bet on them to advance to the Stanley Cup Final.
It's hard to measure postseason performance through the first two rounds since they played completely different opponents, but it's the Stars who have the best expected goal differential amongst all 16 playoffs teams through the first two rounds.
Their expected goal differential sits at +0.78 per 60 minutes of all play and +0.53 per 60 minutes of 5-on-5 play.
In my opinion, the only reason they went six games in Round 1 and seven games in Round 2 is due to worse play from goaltender, Jake Oettinger, than what we've come to expect. His career playoff save percentage is .927 but it has only been .903 so far this year. But, after a strong performance in Game 7 against the Kraken, his game seems to be coming around.
Meanwhile, the Golden Knights have an expected goal differential of -0.11 per 60 minutes and +0.7 during 5-on-5 play.
With that being said, their play was similar during the regular season but they found ways to win games. They aren't an advanced metric darling, but at the end of the day, if you want games that's all the matters.
I've trusted the advanced analytics all season to all success and with the Hurricanes and Stars one series away from facing each other in the Stanley Cup Final as I predicted, I'm not going to change this up now.
As an added prediction, I think the Stars can close this series out in six games.
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Game odds refresh periodically and are subject to change.
