Face-off: 2000 ET, 29/04/2022
Arena: Canada Life Centre
Winnipeg would love to finish off their season with a hat-trick of home wins and have everything in their favour when entertaining Calgary.
The Flames were involved in tough overtime battles last night and on Tuesday, so could be forgiven for now having one eye on the playoffs.
Punters can get 2.5 for the hosts on the money line and that is tempting enough to feature in our Winnipeg Jets vs Calgary Flames predictions.
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Winnipeg Jets Odds
Winnipeg stunned Stanley Cup favourites Colorado 4-1 here last Sunday and then brushed aside Philadelphia 4-0 on Wednesday.
Kyle Connor had a goal and two assists versus the Flyers, while fellow big guns Blake Wheeler and Nikolaj Ehlers each had a goal and an assist.
Pierre-Luc Dubois grabbed a career-high 28th goal of the season and Eric Comrie weighed in with 35 saves for his first NHL shutout.
“I thought we stayed patient,” said coach Dave Lowry. “We missed a couple opportunities, but we didn’t start forcing things. We stayed with what we were looking to do.”
The Jets clearly aren’t ready to start thinking about their summer holidays just yet!
Connor has 92 points via 46 goals and the same number of assists, a franchise-best since the switch from Atlanta to Winnipeg a decade ago.
Looking at the NHL odds for this contest, he can be backed at 11.0 to open the scoring.
Calgary Flames Odds
Darryl Sutter isn’t the type to let his players ease off, despite Calgary being crowned Pacific Division champions with plenty of time to spare.
However, even he must be wary of the fatigue factor ahead of a match which means little to his team’s post-season prospects.
The Flames edged out Nashville 5-4 in overtime after Matthew Tkachuk levelled things up with just one second on the clock.
Last night’s trip to Minnesota ended 2-2 after 60 minutes due to a late equaliser by Elias Lindholm, but the Wild struck early in the extra section.
Sutter said: “We had lots of opportunities to win, but we got taken to the cleaners in the face-off circles. That cost us a couple goals.”
Johnny Gaudreau joined Lindholm and Tkachuk in reaching 40 goals this season, so there really isn’t much left to prove here.
Let’s take a punt on Winnipeg to win by one in regular time at 9.25 to complete our NHL predictions.
Additional stats
Last result:
WINNIPEG 4-0 Philadelphia
Minnesota 3-2 CALGARY (OT)
Season head-to-head: Calgary 3-1 Winnipeg, Calgary 2-4 Winnipeg
