NHL

​3 NHL FanDuel Studs to Target on Monday 1/31/22​

Chris Wassel  —  @ChrisWasselDFS Jan 31st, 2022
Five games are on the NHL schedule to round out January. Who can we trust tonight in NHL DFS?

Spending up in any daily fantasy lineup is how to get the superstars and the highest upside players in your lineup.

In NHL DFS, it’s different from spending up in sports like NBA or NFL. Someone can be one of the highest salaried players at his position and put up a total dud of a performance, and paying that much for him would be a huge mistake. Let’s make sure we are spending salary in the right spots when building our lineups tonight.

Monday night brings us five games on the schedule. Here are a few studs.

Auston Matthews, Center, Toronto Maple Leafs

FanDuel Salary: $10,100

The Toronto Maple Leafs and Auston Matthews benefit from a great matchup on Monday night versus the New Jersey Devils.

New Jersey is down to their fourth and fifth-string goaltenders, and the expectation is that Toronto could easily score four or more goals tonight.

Matthews has not scored a goal in four games but does have four assists in his previous two games. He's also playing nearly 23 minutes a contest. Scoring chances should come fast and furious tonight as Alain Nasreddine is coaching New Jersey (Lindy Ruff has a death in the family).

The one thing we have noticed when Nasreddine coaches New Jersey is this -- everything goes up offensively. Toronto is projected to score 3.8 goals according to our model.

The Maple Leafs do have some lower-salaried stacking options like Michael Bunting and Ilya Mikheyev to consider with Matthews as well.

Jonathan Huberdeau, Wing, Florida Panthers

FanDuel Salary: $9,500

The Florida Panthers forward has been on fire of late. He's even sparked some MVP talk.

He has five double-digit FanDuel point performances in his last six games, and he's posted two 30-plus FanDuel point nights in his last four contests. Huberdeau has 19 shots and 24 scoring chances during this six-game span (two goals and seven assists).

Florida is going up against the Columbus Blue Jackets on Monday. Columbus allows the most shots per goal in the league (35.3). The Panthers average the most shots per contest (36.5). Seems suboptimal for Columbus!

Florida averages 4.04 goals per game in all matchups, so the scoreboard could heat up in Columbus on Monday.

Seth Jones, Defenseman, Chicago Blackhawks

FanDuel Salary: $7,400

The risk of utilizing Seth Jones is well documented, but the Chicago defenseman has a plus-matchup versus the Vancouver Canucks on Monday.

One of the biggest reasons to deploy Jones is his role on the power play. Vancouver's penalty kill is worst in the NHL at 69.5%, and Jones does have 11 power-play assists on the season.

Jones has just three goals on 108 shots this season but is capable of more. He's heating up recently with four assists in his last four games, and he's averaging 2.75 blocked shots per game in that span.

With Chicago's penalty kill ranked 27th as well, this game could cash in on more of their man-advantage opportunities, so all players in this game should see a tiny boost as a result.


Chris Wassel is not a FanDuel employee. In addition to providing DFS gameplay advice, Chris Wassel also participates in DFS contests on FanDuel using his personal account, username chriswassel. While the strategies and player selections recommended in his articles are his/her personal views, he/she may deploy different strategies and player selections when entering contests with his/her personal account. The views expressed in his/her articles are the author’s alone and do not necessarily reflect the views of FanDuel.