Sunday's one-game NHL DFS slate is loaded with top-tier scorers as the Western Conference Semifinals of the 2023 NHL Stanley Cup Playoffs continue. The Edmonton Oilers will look to avoid elimination today at home. Expect them to continue to lean on their top players, with Connor McDavid, Leon Draisaitl, and Ryan Nugent-Hopkins each playing more than 23 minutes in game five. Vegas continues to use a much more well-rounded approach to counteract Edmonton's stars.  This should be an exciting matchup for our NHL DFS Showdown lineups today. As you build daily fantasy hockey lineups for these NHL Playoffs matchups, be sure to check out our NHL daily projections, NHL DFS lineup generator, and other NHL daily fantasy tools. Let's get into our NHL DFS picks and top plays on DraftKings and FanDuel for today's Stanley Cup Playoffs slate!

 

Expected Goal Totals 

Edmonton Oilers: 3.8

Vegas Golden Knights: 2.8

Edmonton Oilers vs Vegas Golden Knights

Players to target: Connor McDavid, Leon Draisaitl, Evan Bouchard, Mark Stone, Chandler Stephenson, Jack Eichel, Brayden McNabb

Edmonton's stars have been stars in this series, but it hasn't always been enough. We saw McDavid, Zach Hyman, and Ryan Nugent-Hopkins all have multi-point games in game five, and Leon Draisaitl is just one point behind McDavid for the playoff scoring lead. All of these players as well as Evander Kane are worth consideration in your lineup today. Vegas has seen their production be much more spread out, however, they have seen Jack Eichel be the stud they envisioned when they traded for him. He has had multi-point games in three of the five games in this series and he has consistently been putting close to five shots on goal each game. Jonathan Marchessault also continues to be a solid DFS performer with five shots or more in four straight games, and he also has five points in his last three games.

For DFS purposes we continue to see a tonne of value from Vegas' defensive group with how they block shots. Alex Pietrangelo will be back for this game if you're looking to buy into a more expensive defenceman. However, you should continue to see value from players like Brayden McNabb, Alec Martinez, and  Zach Whitecloud who continue to be stead shot blockers, and each has contributed some points in this series as well. For the Oilers, Evan Bouchard has had a strong series, with points in four out of five games in this series, and he has the most powerplay points of any player in these playoffs. 

I think if you're going to look to buy into a goalie today it would be Stuart Skinner. Neither team's goalies have been great as a whole, but the teams continue to not be able to win two games in a row, so if you want to take a chance on a goalie, Skinner would be my choice.

When I’m building lineups today I would give some consideration to using either McDavid or Draisaitl in your captain spot, but ultimately I preferred the flexibility I got from using them both in flex spots and then building a more well-rounded from there. At his price, I think Brayden McNabb is a solid play at his price and he should provide you with solid value allowing you to get some of this game's premium players into your lineup. I prefer to avoid goalies in this matchup as this could be another wild one in Edmonton.