The Vancouver Canucks will look to pull themselves back into a playoff spot when they host the scuffling Minnesota Wild Friday evening.

The Canucks kicked off their home-stand with a convincing 3-1 win over the Anaheim Ducks, and are favoured to earn another critical win in this matchup. The Wild continue to suffer through one of the league’s worst injury situations and are just 10-10-0 over the last 20 games.

I’ll detail the relevant game notes, as well as outline my favourite betting angle below.

On December 1st, the Wild ranked first in the NHL with a points percentage of .750, and held the NHL’s best goals against average of 2.33. Their level of play has dropped off severely since that point, and it seems to be a combination of two factors at this point.

They have dealt with a number of significant absences from the lineup, as at various points, their injury report has featured four or more critical pieces. It also seems likely that they were playing above their heads early on, and the roster was not likely to sustain that level of play for the entirety of the season.

Entering this matchup, the Wild are still missing three excellent skaters, as Kirill Kaprizov, Joel Eriksson Ek and Jonas Brodin will all remain sidelined.

Kaprizov was the betting favourite to win the Hart Trophy entering the holiday break and has played just three games since that point. Eriksson Ek has put up 24 points in 42 games while being one of the league’s premier defensive forwards. Brodin has been one of the best shutdown defenders in the league and continues to be vastly underrated, playing on a team that does not draw all that much coverage.

Even with those three still on the IR, the Wild are actually healthier now than they were throughout parts of January.

On the analytical side, the Wild have also regressed significantly. They held strong underlying results early in the year, including elite defensive metrics. Over the last 10 games they hold an expected goal share of just 46.65%, and have generated just 2.73 xGF/60.

Filip Gustavsson has been confirmed as the starting goaltender in this matchup. He still holds excellent numbers overall this season, with a +13.4 GSAx and .914 save percentage, but has been far less dominant over the last two months of play.

At the time of writing the Canucks are still yet to make any trades prior to the official trade deadline, which will take place in a couple hours at 12 PM PST. Brock Boeser and Pius Suter are the team’s two most likely candidates to still be dealt, and their potential absences likely would not mean roster players in tonight’s matchup at this point. Therefore it would be wise to hold tight on any bets involving backing the Canucks to win specifically, as you will probably get a slightly better number later on if they were to be traded.

GM Patrik Allvin certainly has to be at least seeing what offers are out there on Boeser, as the 28 year-old has reportedly declined reasonable offers to stay with the Canucks long-term, and based on other deadline deals Boeser could yield quite a return. As the top contenders in the West continue to load up, it’s becoming harder to make a case that Vancouver is close to being a legitimate contender this season.

Over the last 27 games the Canucks are 11-12-4, and have scored only 2.22 goals per game. For a third of the entire season, head coach Rick Tocchet’s offence has looked quite lethargic, and Boeser hasn’t exactly been a game-breaker, netting just 15 points across those 27 games.

The Canucks took advantage of a favourable scheduling spot on Wednesday, as dominated the Ducks in a 3-2 win, a game which was not as competitive as the final score-line suggested. The Canucks held a 11-4 edge in high-danger scoring chances, and outshot the Ducks 36-16, playing without Captain Quinn Hughes.

Hughes remains listed as day-to-day, and his status for this matchup is unclear.

Wednesday’s matchup was one of Elias Pettersson‘s (F) best performances in a while, as in his 20 minutes of play the Canucks allowed zero high danger scoring chances, and he finished with a 94.48% expected goal share. While that performance really shouldn’t be noteworthy for the team’s highest-salaried player, it is a step in the right direction, to be sure.

With their top line of Pettersson, Conor Garland and Dakota Joshua on the ice the Canucks outshot the Ducks 9-1. Joshua and Garland have both looked excellent recently, and they seemed to help inspire a more engaged performance from Pettersson.

Kevin Lankinen is expected to get the start in goal. He holds a -0.1 GSAx and a .902 save percentage in 37 appearances this season.

This presents as an interesting matchup to see where these two sides are at, as both teams are surely viewing it as a winnable matchup. At their best, the Wild have been one of the league’s best defensive teams in the league this season, but their play has tailed off considerably over a relatively large sample.

I’m still not sold that the Wild are this bad, and am not quite interested in backing the Canucks to win this matchup at the current price of -128.

This does look like a good spot to back Garland to record over 2.5 shots on goal, something he has done in four of the last seven games. The Canucks newly formed top line generated a ton of chances in the team’s previous matchup, and it could be a good time to back Garland in this market while the price is still so long.

It’s also possible that Garland will garner slightly more power play minutes if Boeser is traded ahead of this game and that Tocchet may lean more heavily upon his top unit if the second line is lacking Boeser’s presence.