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Welcome back RotoBallers! The NHL season continues in Week 3 and we have a wonderful salary cap contest for you over at OwnersBox!
In case you're not yet familiar, OwnersBox is a fantastic new weekly fantasy sports platform that offers plenty of game setups to fulfill your desire to draft throughout the season. And the big one that we're focusing on right now: NHL weekly salary cap contests!
In this article, I will be providing you with my weekly fantasy hockey lineup picks on OwnersBox for the Saturday-Friday Contest of the Week for Week 3 (Oct 23-29). This contest is not anything like a standard DFS contest or your season-long leagues. Read my picks below, and then join us in this tournament as we battle it out for the cash prizes!
$5K Contest for Week 3!
OwnersBox is hooking up RotoBaller readers to celebrate the launch of their new salary cap style contests, so be sure to take advantage of these promo offers!
- Join this week's freeroll on OwnersBox - the contest is completely free to enter for new users with code NHL10, and there's a $5,000 cash guaranteed prize pool. You can also enter up to 18 lineups at $10 per lineup if you want more chances to win.
You can enter up until Saturday, October 23 at 6:55 pm ET.
OwnersBox Forward Picks
On OwnersBox, you have the option of picking five forwards in all.
Aleksander Barkov, FLA ($8,800) - vs PHI, ARZ, BOS, DET
No NHL team has been more fun to watch in the early going than the Florida Panthers. It is more that they are undefeated, the Florida top line keeps producing points. Consider his relatively cheap price but remember roster limits this week. There is a limit of 16 games among five forwards.
The Boston game is at home. Philadelphia and Detroit are road games against penalty kills that were and are among the bottom-third in the NHL. Florida features a top-five caliber power-play with Aaron Ekblad 100%. Barkov leads a Florida team that possesses enough depth to keep defenses honest.
Is Florida the new "Team Fun"? That may be too early to say. However, Barkov has five points in four games. What may be even better for Barkov owners is he had five shots and four scoring chances on Thursday against Colorado.
Kirill Kaprizov, MIN ($8,100) - vs NSH, ARZ, SEA
It's been a pretty easy season for Kirill Kaprizov who has five assists in three games this season for the Minnesota Wild.
However, this is a player who was on nearly a 40-goal pace last season (38 to be exact). Kaprizov has seven shots and nine scoring chances so far. He has missed some point-blank chances as well which is quite unusual. However. linemate Joel Eriksson Ek has reaped the rewards. Ek has three goals on 12 shots this year. No one should be concerned with Kaprizov's lack of goals early on. Furthermore, there should be a plethora of opportunities against Arizona and Seattle as next week goes on.
Arizona allowed five more goals against the Edmonton Oilers on Thursday night and Seattle had allowed ten goals in their previous two games. Goals, shots, and points count here on OwnersBox, and Kaprizov's salary is reasonable for an upper-tier player.
Editor's note: Consider Alex Ovechkin if one wants to spend up in salary this week with matchups versus Ottawa, Detroit, and Arizona. He is also only $8,900.
OwnersBox Defensemen Picks
Kevin Shattenkirk, ANA ($3,500) - vs WPG, BUF, VGK
Another week and another value defender to roster. That is right. Kevin Shattenkirk has been producing in a nice, secondary role for the Anaheim Ducks.
Will six points in five games continue for Shattenkirk? Absolutely not. However, this price is again a pure-value play. He is averaging two shots and nearly two blocks a game to add to his point totals on OwnersBox.
Again, it is the secondary role that is keeping Shattenkirk rested. The Anaheim defender is playing about 90 seconds less a night than he did last year. The almost 33-year old blueliner is on a younger Ducks team. Anaheim, in the early going, has shown flashes of offense.
Please again note that Anaheim technically plays four games this week but the Saturday game against Minnesota is not being scored.
OwnersBox Goaltender Picks
Igor Shesterkin, NYR ($11,100) - vs CGY, CLS
Igor Shesterkin has re-emerged again as a not-so-darkhorse Vezina Trophy candidate this season. Shesterkin showed great form last year before a slight late downturn by the New York Rangers.
The goaltender is 3-0-1 in four starts with a stellar 1.47 goals-against-average and .943 save percentage. More significant is the two home contests New York has this week. Again, the Saturday game against Ottawa does not count because it is before the start of the weekly slate.
Columbus and Calgary on the road have produced lightly this year which should allow Shesterkin opportunities to produce higher points despite just two potential starts.
Braden Holtby, DAL ($10,000) - vs CLS, VGK, OTT
His early start on the season went largely unnoticed because Dallas was on a four-game road trip. Next week, the Stars' only road game is in Columbus. That will be a bit risky but home dates with Vegas and Ottawa could make up for that.
Holtby is not all that expensive at $10,000. For goaltenders, that is not as much of a risk as one would think. Is the goaltender going to stay around 25 OwnersBox points a game? No. Would 20-22 be reasonable? Probably. The nice part is that if the Dallas goalie can face a bit over 30 shots a game (currently 31.3 per contest), that would pad his numbers.
Sample Lineup
Here's a lineup I built using some of the players from this article:
