Ducks-Oilers Open Game 1 While Flyers, Wild, and Hurricanes Chase 2-0 Series Leads

Monday night is the most loaded NHL playoff card of the opening week. Four games, four different stories, and every single one of them will shift a series either into a commanding spot or back to square one. The Anaheim Ducks finally arrive on the postseason stage for the first time since 2018, visiting a banged-up Edmonton Oilers team for Game 1 at Rogers Place. The Philadelphia Flyers, fresh off a 3-2 Game 1 road win, try to complete the heist against the Penguins. Carolina hosts Ottawa after taking Game 1 2-0. And Minnesota, coming off a 6-1 destruction of Dallas in Game 1, now gets the spot every underdog dreams about: a chance to walk out of the 2 seed's building with a 2-0 series lead. Let's get into it.

Series Scoreboard Heading Into Monday

Before we break down the individual games, here is where each of tonight's series sits. The Flyers lead 1-0 after a 3-2 road win over the Penguins in Pittsburgh. The Hurricanes took Game 1 over Ottawa by a 2-0 score to go up 1-0. Minnesota stomped Dallas 6-1 in the American Airlines Center in Game 1 and now leads 1-0. And Anaheim and Edmonton have not yet dropped the puck, so Game 1 tonight sets the tone. Three of the four games have a 2-0 series shift on the line. Only one game can still go either way in terms of which team holds home-ice leverage.

Game 1: Anaheim Ducks at Edmonton Oilers, 10:00 PM ET (ESPN2)

This is the headline of the night. The Ducks are back in the playoffs for the first time since 2018, riding a youth wave headlined by Cutter Gauthier's 41-goal, franchise-record season and Leo Carlsson's 67-point breakout as a second-overall pick finally finding his ceiling at 21 years old. Lukas Dostal is the goaltender, and while his .888 save percentage is not eye-popping, he has been trending up over the final three weeks of the regular season and faced Edmonton twice this year with a .912 save percentage against the full-strength version of the Oilers offense.

The entire market on this game is built around Leon Draisaitl's second-degree MCL injury from March 15. He is a game-time decision for Game 1, and even if he plays, he is unlikely to log anywhere near his normal shift volume. The Oilers without Draisaitl at full strength are a top-heavy team that leans entirely on Connor McDavid's 138-point engine and Evan Bouchard's 95-point blue-line quarterbacking. Anaheim's structure under Greg Cronin is built specifically to suffocate that kind of one-line dependence. Oilers are -178 at home, Ducks are +146 to +160 depending on your book, and the puck line is Ducks +1.5 at roughly -155. Game 1 dogs of this profile have covered the puck line at better than 60 percent historically, and with the Draisaitl variable, that number has a chance to run even higher. The public will hammer Edmonton because of McDavid and home ice. The sharper read is that Ducks +1.5 and moneyline dog value are both live in this spot.

Game 2: Philadelphia Flyers at Pittsburgh Penguins, 7:00 PM ET (ESPN)

The Flyers stole Game 1 in Pittsburgh, winning 3-2 in a game that probably should not have gone their way based on shot share and expected goals. Samuel Ersson was the story, stopping 34 of 36 shots and bailing Philadelphia out on two separate Pittsburgh power plays in the third period. Travis Konecny scored the game-winner with 7:22 left in the third, and the Flyers are now in the exact spot every road underdog dreams about. They already have the split they needed, and if they can find a way to drag Game 2 into overtime or steal it outright, they head back home with a 2-0 stranglehold.

Pittsburgh's problem is that the Penguins do not have the margin for error against a team that has been defensively stingy for two months. Sidney Crosby and Evgeni Malkin combined for just four shots on goal in Game 1, and the Penguins power play went 0-for-3. If that profile repeats, Pittsburgh has no path to winning this series. The line for Game 2 has Pittsburgh at roughly -135 as a bounce-back home favorite with a total of 5.5, which is on the lower end for a playoff hockey game and reflects how well both goaltenders played in Game 1. The key to watch is whether the Penguins open with the same flat start they had Game 1, or if they come out with the kind of desperation a 0-2 deficit would require.

Game 2: Ottawa Senators at Carolina Hurricanes, 7:30 PM ET (ESPN2)

Carolina shut out Ottawa 2-0 in Game 1 behind a vintage Pyotr Kochetkov performance and the kind of suffocating neutral-zone structure the Hurricanes have built their entire identity around. The Senators managed just 18 shots on goal, and none of them were high-danger. That is the problem when you play Carolina: they do not let you generate the kind of chances that goaltenders give up, and when they do give up a chance, the defensive structure usually erases it before it matters. For Ottawa, the adjustment has to be getting Brady Tkachuk and Tim Stutzle off the perimeter and onto the inside of the dots. That is easier to diagram than to execute against Rod Brind'Amour's system.

The Hurricanes are -175 at home tonight with a 5.5 total. The reason the line is so heavy is that Carolina's Game 1 defensive performance was not a fluke. It was who they are. Ottawa's best realistic path to winning Game 2 is getting Linus Ullmark to stand on his head and hoping to catch the Hurricanes on a special-teams breakdown. That is not a high-probability scenario over 60 minutes. The Canes +1 on the alt line at plus money and Canes ML both look live. Ottawa's bigger question is whether they can actually find any offense at all, and if the answer is no, this series ends in five games.

Game 2: Minnesota Wild at Dallas Stars, 9:30 PM ET (ESPN)

Minnesota absolutely demolished Dallas 6-1 in Game 1, and that result was almost impossible to see coming given how the two teams finished the regular season. Kirill Kaprizov had a goal and three assists. Matt Boldy scored twice. Filip Gustavsson stopped 34 of 35 shots. The Stars were thoroughly outplayed in every area of the ice, and the 6-1 final somehow still undersold how lopsided the game actually was. That puts Dallas in a corner. A Game 2 loss sends them home trailing 2-0 with both games played in their own building, and the pressure on Pete DeBoer to adjust is immense.

The market's response to Game 1 has been measured. Dallas opened as -165 home favorites, not the -200 number you might expect from a team that was the 2 seed in the Central. The reason the market is cautious is that the underlying numbers in Game 1 were not a fluke. Minnesota dominated possession, dominated special teams, and dominated goaltending. Dallas will almost certainly play better in Game 2, but "better" might only get them to competitive, not victorious. Wild +1.5 at minus money is a reasonable hedge play. The total sits at 5.5, which feels low after a 6-1 Game 1, but reflects the expectation that Dallas tightens the defensive structure in a must-win spot.

Three Angles to Watch Across the Slate

Game 2 Bounce-Back Is a Myth at This Number

There is a popular narrative that Game 1 losers rally in Game 2 because of adjustments and desperation. The data does not really back that up when the losing team is juiced at -150 or higher in Game 2. Since 2014, Game 2 home favorites of -140 or heavier who lost Game 1 at home have gone just 52 percent ATS against the puck line in Game 2. That is not an edge. The reason is that the Game 1 loss usually reflects a real structural or goaltending issue, and those do not disappear overnight. Flyers +1.5 and Wild +1.5 tonight both fit this profile perfectly.

Goaltender Performance Carries Through Round 1

The single strongest predictor of Round 1 series outcomes is not scoring, shot share, or special teams. It is starting goaltender save percentage through the first two games. If your goalie is at .920 or better through two games, your team has won the series 71 percent of the time historically. Kochetkov, Gustavsson, Ersson, and Dostal are the four netminders to watch tonight. Whoever stacks the strongest two-game sample over the next 48 hours is betting favorite to ride that form through a 4-2 series win.

Injury Leverage on the Ducks-Oilers Series Price

Edmonton is -475 to win the series. That series price is being built around the assumption of a full-strength Oilers lineup. If Draisaitl misses Game 1, or plays 12 minutes instead of his usual 22, the real probability of Edmonton advancing drops into the 72 to 74 percent range rather than the 82 percent the series price implies. That is meaningful value on Anaheim at +350 series price if you are a futures player. The single-game play tonight is the Ducks +1.5 puck line, but the series futures number is worth a look for bettors who want exposure to the Draisaitl variable over a seven-game sample.

The Big Picture

By midnight tonight, three of the four current series will either be 2-0 or 1-1, and Ducks-Oilers will have a Game 1 result on the board. If Philadelphia and Minnesota both grab Game 2, we have two genuine upset-brewing narratives heading back to the underdogs' home buildings. If Carolina handles Ottawa and Edmonton pounces on a vulnerable Ducks team, the favorites restore order and the narrative resets to chalk. The variance on a single Monday is massive, and that is what makes early-round playoff hockey the best betting slate on the entire sports calendar. Pick your spots, trust the goaltending data, and pay attention to the Draisaitl report right up until puck drop in Edmonton.