Carolina Hurricanes vs. Pittsburgh Penguins: Prediction, Preview, Picks & Odds - 11/29/2022

Time: 7 p.m. ET

Venue: PPG Paints Arena, Pittsburgh, PA

Where to watch: BSSO, ATTSN-PT

DraftKings: Penguins -120, Hurricanes +100

FanDuel: Penguins -114, Hurricanes -105

BetMGM: Penguins -115, Hurricanes -105

Caesars: Penguins -120, Hurricanes +100

Hurricanes: 11-6-5

Penguins: 11-8-3

Hurricanes: won 3-2 vs. Flames on Saturday

Penguins: lost 4-1 vs. Maple Leafs on Saturday

It's not often you can look at a team’s last 10 games and really ponder how life is that cruel to them. For that, I point you to the Carolina Hurricanes. They are 3-3-4 in their last ten games, which means they have lost seven games overall but four of them have come in the overtime variety so at least Carolina is banking points at the correct time. The only downside for Carolina is despite coming off a 3-2 victory at home against the Calgary Flames the other day, the Pittsburgh Penguins now await them at their barn in which Pittsburgh is now playing like one of the top teams in the Eastern Conference. I know, you are extremely shocked, and here is my shocked face.

Carolina is off to a little bit of a rocky start and part of it has to do with the fact that Freddie Anderson is not available in net right now. They have had to go through the likes of Antti Raanta and Pyotr Kochetkov to kind of keep them afloat. And it's not like Carolina is playing horrendously bad. They are still with 27 points in a very good spot as the calendar turns to December very soon. But yet through all of this Carolina has struggled to win games. I don't think we've ever gotten to the point where Carolina is in a position to struggle like this so early in the season. I look back at last year, and obviously, Carolina was one of the top teams in the league. When healthy and operating at full efficiency, they still are.

But I can assure you that when it comes to Carolina it's not fully everyone else's fault like people wouldn't make it out to be. Martin Necas is having an amazing breakout season with 24 points in 22 games, including ten goals. He is one point ahead of Sebastian Aho for the team lead in points. They're also getting really good play in the blue line from Brent Burns, because when in the world did we think that was going to actually be a thing? And the goaltending has been somewhat up and down but it could be better.

All in all there's not much you can look at Carolina and say well there's the problem. Because there aren't that many problems. Sure they let a few games get away given how their true number-one goaltender has not been available for quite some time. And given how he should have been a serious contender for the Vezina trophy last year, we know how good he can be. And it was evident last year that if he was healthy, Carolina probably would have been playing in the Eastern Conference finals against the Tampa Bay Lightning and not the New York Rangers.

But the way things are looking right now, Pittsburgh might be well on their way to making another deep playoff run. Because just when it seems like we're throwing the dirt on the Penguins and they're about to be fully covered, they go full undertaker in the buried alive match where they just stick their hand out of the grave and it just excites all the people no matter how stupid it may have looked in 1996, but I digress. Nevertheless, the Penguins are winning a bunch of games right now and the fact that they have been able to turn it around by going 7-2-1 in their last ten with Sidney Crosby playing out of his mind, is exactly what Pittsburgh needed in a time when a lot of people were again throwing the dirt on them.

Pittsburgh has gotten great goaltending from Casey to Smith and Tristan Jarry and they continue to play well with the likes of Crosby having another MVP-type season and Evgeni Malkin putting up 20 points in what has been another strong start to the year for him as well. But the Penguins are one of those weird teams where they go on a long stretch of losing for a long time and suddenly start they start winning, and you really don't know how to take them seriously. I do think Pittsburgh is really good and I do think that Pittsburgh has the ability to be a really strong team this year. But I think we're all waiting for that one game from Carolina where they just hammer everything home for 60 minutes and all of a sudden look like a really good team. That's what I'm looking for here.

I do think Carolina will win this game but it is going to be a low-scoring affair. I think Carolina when operating at full health, is one of the top three teams in the east. Right now it doesn't look like that, but at some point they're gonna have to show that and to do that against the red hot Pittsburgh team is one way to start. Hurricanes win 3-2 

Hurricanes are 102-100 on the road after losing 3 of 4 since 1996.

Hurricanes are 135-139 on the road after failing to cover 4 or 5 of their last 6.

Penguins are 3-10 on their third game in 5 days this season.

Hurricanes:

Stefan Noesen -- Sebastian Aho -- Martin Necas

Andrei Svechnikov -- Jack Drury -- Seth Jarvis

Jordan Martinook -- Jordan Staal -- Jesper Fast

Paul Stastny -- Jesperi Kotkaniemi -- Derek Stepan

Jaccob Slavin -- Brent Burns

Brady Skjei -- Brett Pesce

Calvin de Haan -- Jalen Chatfield

Antti Raanta

Penguins:

Jake Guentzel -- Sidney Crosby -- Rickard Rakell

Jason Zucker -- Evgeni Malkin -- Bryan Rust

Brock McGinn -- Jeff Carter -- Danton Heinen

Ryan Poehling -- Teddy Blueger -- Josh Archibald

Marcus Pettersson -- Kris Letang

Pierre-Olivier Joseph -- Jeff Petry

Brian Dumoulin -- Jan Rutta

Tristan Jarry