Posted at 10:00 AM EST. Odds are subject to change.

Columbus -½ +120 over Philadelphia

Regulation only

7:00 PM EST. Philadelphia does not score. The Flyers average 2.24 goals a game, and Matvei Michkov leads the team with 10 goals because nobody else is finishing anything. Trevor Zegras has 4 goals on 45 shots, Tyson Foerster has 4 on 42, and the power play converts under 19 percent. When a team cannot score, it cannot win on the road in regulation, and that is the whole bet here. Columbus does not need to be great tonight. It needs to be competent for 60 minutes against an offence that cannot buy a goal.

The goaltending lines up the same way. Cam Talbot is projected to start for Columbus, and he is 5-3-0 with a 2.51 goals-against average and a .909 save percentage. Philadelphia's Dan Vladar is 3-4-4 with a 3.24 average and an .879 save percentage, and Joseph Woll has not been much better. The Flyers are on the road after playing at Edmonton on Wednesday, and they are walking into a building where the home team has the better goalie, the last change, and the better top line.

The schedule is the other half of this bet. Tonight is the fifth and final game of a road trip that started on November 5, ten days on the road through New York, Calgary, Vancouver and Edmonton, and the Flyers fly home right after the game to face Edmonton again tomorrow night. Philadelphia is 2-6-3 on the road this season, and the last game of a long trip is where tired teams run out of gas. The bags are packed, home is one flight away, and Columbus is sitting at home, rested, waiting for a team that has been living out of a suitcase for a week and a half.

That top line is the difference maker. Kent Johnson leads Columbus with 8 goals and 9 assists, Adam Fantilli centres the line with Matthew Knies on the other wing, and Zach Werenski runs the point on the top pair with Damon Severson. The Blue Jackets have the scorers, the puck mover on the back end, and the home ice to get the matchups they want. Philadelphia has Michkov and not much else, and Michkov cannot outscore a whole line by himself.

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