St. Louis Blues vs Nashville Predators, NHL Picks

This projection and current market action are supplementary and do not influence the final qualitative pick and analysis of today's game.

St. Louis gets the nod on the moneyline because the two most important factors in this game both point the same direction. Joel Hofer has been one of the better starters in the 2026-27 season, and Juuse Saros has been meaningfully below his usual standard, so the goaltending gap is real and it runs toward the Blues. Nashville's offense compounds the problem on their end, ranking near the bottom of the league in shot generation and overall scoring, which means Hofer is stepping into a favorable workload. The strongest counterargument is Nashville's clean injury report against a Blues lineup that is genuinely short-handed on the blue line, most notably without Colton Parayko, and that is a real concern. But the Blues have been the more consistent side in recent play during the 2026-27 season, winning more often than not while Nashville has dropped the large majority of their recent outings, so the form picture undercuts the health advantage Nashville holds. Both teams are on the second night of a back-to-back, so there is no rest edge to apply in either direction. The Blues carry the stronger defensive structure anchored by Hofer, and they are facing a Nashville attack that has to lean almost entirely on its power play to generate meaningful offense, which runs directly into one of the better penalty kill units in the game.

The under is the play here because both teams bring profiles that lean toward fewer goals rather than more, and the primary offensive paths available to each side face real resistance from the other. Nashville generates low shot volume and scores less than most teams, and their path to impact runs through a power play that ranks among the best in the league but runs directly into a Blues penalty kill unit that is also among the stingiest in the game. St. Louis scores at roughly league-average rates, and they are doing it against a Nashville defense that brings a physical, shot-blocking presence near the top of the league even if their goaltending is not elite. Hofer's efficiency in the 2026-27 season adds another layer of suppression on the Nashville side, keeping the net tighter than Saros has managed at the other end. The strongest counterargument is Nashville's power play, which is genuinely dangerous and could single-handedly inflate the score if the Blues take penalties at a high rate. But the Blues penalty kill is built specifically to counter that kind of unit, and even strength play from both sides is fairly unremarkable, meaning the game has to lean on special teams volume to get over any total, and that volume is not a given. The back-to-back fatigue on both sides further reduces the likelihood of a high-event, high-scoring game, and the combination of two defensive-leaning structures with one genuinely strong goaltender makes the under the more grounded position across the full body of evidence from the 2026-27 season.