NHL Betting: Ovechkin's Capitals host Stamkos and the Lightning

Despite barely being into March, the Washington Capitals have already clinched the Southeast Division, and they did it without having to take the ice. With an astonishing 33 point lead over both the Tampa Bay Lightning and Atlanta Thrashers, with both teams having just 16 games left in the regular season, it doesn’t take a math whiz to figure out that they’re out of reach.

Tampa Bay knew they were out of the division race by Christmas, and their focus has simply been to make the playoffs. Well, they’re going to need to put some wins together and hope for some help as they are currently six-points behind the eighth-seeded Boston Bruins.

And if Tampa thinks that just because Washington has the division and a playoff spot locked up that they’re just going to shut it down for the rest of the season, they are sorely mistaken.

The Caps focus is now on making sure they win the Eastern Conference title and that they are tops in the entire league when the season is all said and done. The Eastern Conference isn’t much of a race as they have a 14-point lead over the Pittsburgh Penguins but they have San Jose and Chicago hot on their tails for the league’s best record as the Sharks are just 4 points back while the Blackhawks sit 6 points from the top.

The Capitals clinched the division title on Wednesday from the couch thanks to Atlanta's regulation loss against Columbus. With the conference championship, Washington becomes the first NHL club to win their division, but also is the first to secure a playoff spot.

Here are some betting trends for the game tonight:

• Over is 4-1 in the last 5 meetings in Washington.
• Over is 6-2-2 in the last 10 meetings.
• Favorite is 19-7 in the last 26 meetings.
• Lightning are 5-16 in the last 21 meetings.
• Lightning are 0-7 in the last 7 meetings in Washington.

Both teams are coming off overtime contests, as the Bolts were dealt a 4-3 loss on Thursday in Toronto while the Caps are coming off a hard fought victory against the pesky Carolina Hurricanes. Tomas Fleischmann netted the sudden death winner with 1:40 remaining in overtime to lift the Caps to the 4-3 decision.

Tampa Bay’s new stud, Steven Stamkos, had a goal and an assist, pushing his point streak to a franchise-record 18 games. What is more impressive is that with the tally, he stretched his goal scoring string to seven contests and put him at 42 goals on the season, which is only behind Alex Ovechkin Sidney Crosby for the league lead.

The NHL’s leading scorer, Alex Ovechkin, added two assists in the win adding to his total of 94 points this year. So, if nothing else, this will be a matchup of two of the NHL’s elite snipers. In terms of betting, this isn’t much of a contest as Washington is a ridiculous 26-3-4 as the host this season and should be shouldn’t have any problem with the Lightning.

The play for me is on the puckline (-1 ½) on the Capitals.

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