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NHL Free Pick: Senators vs. Bruins Betting Odds & Handicapping Preview

NHL Lines: Ottawa vs Boston Pick

It’s a matinee matchup in Beantown as Atlantic Division rivals will square off when the Ottawa Senators (11-12-5) take on the Boston Bruins (15-13-1). Cappers Picks will provide free NHL picks all season so check back often.

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Ottawa vs Boston
When: Saturday Dec. 13, 1:00 pm EST
Where: TD Bank Garden
TV: TSN
NHL Gambling Line: Ottawa +198 / Boston -221
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This will be the second meeting of five this season between these two Atlantic Division foes. The Bruins took the first meeting by a score of 4-2 in Boston.

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Ottawa is reeling after a quick start that had them in a battle among the top three in the Atlantic and have slid all the way to seventh, ahead of only the lowly Sabres.

Senators

The aforementioned slide of the Sens was easy to see coming for those in the know, and even those who may not follow the Senators that closely. This team is just not deep in terms of talent at any position really.

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Bobby Ryan is the team’s most talented forward by a long shot, but he doesn’t have a wealth of support out there. Clarke MacArthur is on the team’s top line along with Kyle Turris, none of those three has eclipsed 20 points yet and MacArthur and Turris are a combined -14.

Erik Karlsson could make a case for most talented player on the Sens but there’s only so much he can do from the blue line.

Karlsson leads the team in points with 20 but he has had a very tough time in his own zone this year and is a team worst -12.

It looks as though young netminder Robin Lehner will get the call ahead of Craig Anderson today and you can take that as you want.

Lehner has a 5-4-1 record and stats that don’t exactly leap off the page with a 2.86 GAA and .914 SV%.

Bruins

The Bruins are who we thought they were. When I say “we” I’m mostly talking about myself, as I think I might be out on my own in saying the Bruins really aren’t that good of a hockey team.

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After a Presidents Trophy winning campaign a year ago, the Bruins look much more like the team they really are this year, and that’s slow and deficient on offense. The B’s have really struggled in the absence of David Krejci and have only managed 74 goals as a team in 29 games.

They still play a pretty tough brand of defensive hockey and getting Zdeno Chara back from injury should help out, but this team is still going to struggle to produce goals as there just isn’t that much scoring punch up front.

Remember Phil Kessel? Tyler Seguin?

Those guys that “didn’t fit the Bruins style”? Well the latter is leading the NHL in scoring and the former is seventh in the league.

Kessel’s 29 points is leaps and bounds ahead of Boston’s current leading scorer Patrice Bergeron who has just 20 points on the campaign and the team’s leading scorer is Brad Marchand with just eight goals. Boston’s second leading scorer? Carl Soderberg with just 18 points.

Anyone seen Milan Lucic this year?

That “Bruins style” play from Milan has amounted to a whopping 13 points in 28 games. Great…

Senators vs. Bruins 4* Free Pick

For all of the Bruins’ deficiencies on offense, they still manage to get the job done against bad teams and that’s what they’re up against today.

The Sens are just not a good team and if Boston has proven anything this year it’s that they can beat weak teams, but that’s about it.

This game won’t be flashy or overly exciting, probably a 2-1 win for Boston where they’ll employ the familiar strategy of playing pretty mediocre hockey for 45 minutes, turn it on for the last 15 minutes of the third period and pop a few goals to get the win.

Go with Boston to take this one.

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By Matt Durnan

A (self-proclaimed) fantasy sports guru since 2004 and a journalist since 2007. He has been offering unsolicited sports gambling advice to his circle of friends for years and has now put himself at the mercy of online readers everywhere. "It's not whether you win or lose, it's how much fun you have"... His hockey coach told him that when he was 7. His team lost every game that year.