They say that a best-of-seven series doesn't really start until the road team wins a game. If the San Jose Sharks are to become the first team to capture a road game in the Western Conference semis, they'll be moving on at the expense of the Nashville Predators.
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ODDS ANALYSIS
The Sharks have been favored in virtually every game in this series, but the exception was Game 3 by a narrow margin. That was a game which Nashville really had to win to keep any hope alive of winning this series, and it was the -110 favorite as a result.
We suspect the Preds will be the slight choice of the oddsmakers in a game which will be lined closely one way or the other.
GOALIE REPORT
Pekka Rinne had a night he'd rather forget in Game 5. He allowed four goals on just 27 shots before mercifully getting yanked for Carter Hutton with just a few minutes left in the game.
Rinne though, has been spectacular here at home in this series. He's got a .946 save percentage at home against the Sharks in the playoffs, and we have to think if that's what he does in this game, we'll be heading back to San Jose for a decisive Game 7.
LIVE BETTING
The big boys for the Sharks came up big in Game 5, and that's what makes this team oh so dangerous at this level.
Patrick Marleau had a goal and an assist. Joe Pavelski scored two goals. Joe Thornton had an assist. Logan Couture had a goal. Even the up and coming Joonas Donskoi, who has looked so dangerous in this series, had a pair of helpers.
Every single man we just listed is capable of having two or three goals in a game and can take the proceedings over by himself.
Go ahead and look up and down the Nashville bench and see if you can find a man who can do the same thing. You can't.
Sure, Mike Fisher, the Game 4 hero, has five goals in 12 playoff games, but Colin Wilson's 12 points in 12 games isn't going to cut it without help. No one had more than 64 points in the regular season for Nashville, and the team's leading scorer, Filip Forsberg, has a total of one point in his last nine games.
QUICK PICK
We mentioned in the preview for Game 5 that fatigue really could've been an issue for the Predators, and it surely was. They were run ragged right out of the blocks when Marleau scored that first goal of the game, and they never really got back into it from there.
Frustration is setting in. Both Mike Ribeiro and Ryan Johansen picked up misconducts at the tail end of Game 5, and we just aren't sure that mentally, the Preds are ready to play at this level.
San Jose has been the best team in the West for our money in these playoffs, and it'll be a deserving participant in the Western Conference Finals after finally cracking the code to win on the road in this series.
NHL Odds: Sharks 2, Predators 1
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