NHL Best Bets 4/18/26 – Playoffs Round One

Last Update: Sat Apr 18, 2026, 2:37 pm ET

Read Time: 7 minutes

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It begins today. The road to the Stanley Cup. There will be blood, sweat, tears and a whole bunch of NHL best bets to keep those accounts nice and fat throughout the playoffs. And boy oh boy, will day one of the NHL Playoffs not disappoint. Ottawa Senators and Carolina Hurricanes could be a bloodbath, so load up on hits and blocked shots props. Meanwhile we get the first game of two of the marquee series in Minnesota Wild vs Dallas Stars and Philadelphia Flyers vs Pittsburgh Penguins. Due to the start time of the Senators vs Hurricanes this article will focus on the later two S-Tier caliber games. So let's dig right into the NHL best bets.

We will be breaking down NHL best bets here at Betting News all playoffs long! Each article will look for VALUE, as in straights you can take to build up your bankroll or pieces you can use to beef up your parlays. All bets will be -135 or better odds. And while we will focus on NHL player props, there are times we will take sides and totals. So keep your eyes peeled here as we will drop these throughout the week.

And if you haven't already be sure to check out some of my favorite futures and awards. So time to lace them up and get ready to ride with Betzky for my favorite NHL best bets of the day.

1. Sidney Crosby 3 SOG + a Point +165 on Lucky Rebel:

Penguins forward Sidney Crosby works the puck behind the net with a Bruins defender on him.

You couldn't chalk up a better Round One battle than the battle of Pennsylvania. This historic and bloody rivalry has been heated ever since the inception of both the Pittsburgh Penguins and Philadelphia Flyers, but over the recent years has cooled off ever so slightly as both teams have struggled. But here we are, in 2026 and both Pennsylvania teams managed to draw each other Round One while simultaneously surprising the hockey world with their playoff births. And this could be Sidney Crosby's last run for a Cup and last battle against the Flyers in the postseason (I'm tearing up).

Let's start with the penguin in the room. Crosby has 60 goals, 79 assists and a plus-17 rating in 93 career games against the Philadelphia Flyers — the most goals and the most points any player has ever produced against Philadelphia in franchise history. This is not a matchup. This is a hunting ground. And it isn't just a general trend — it's one that shows up specifically in shot volume. On Saturdays against the Flyers over his career, Crosby averages 3.52 shots on goal per game. Today is Saturday. The number for this prop is 3. The signs align and it's clear why this is an NHL best bet.

Pittsburgh made the deliberate decision to rest its veterans — including Crosby — in the final regular season games. His absence from the lineup against St. Louis was purely precautionary ahead of the postseason. That means Crosby steps into Game 1 tonight fresh-legged, with extra days of rest, fully healthy, and pointed directly at a Philadelphia team he has dominated across two decades. There is no better motivational cocktail for Sidney Crosby than a playoff opener on home ice against a familiar rival with his legacy potentially on the line.

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2. Mikko Rantanen Assist -118 on Lucky Rebel:

Stars forward Mikko Rantanen skates towards the net during a game

These articles will be all about finding value with some NHL best bets, and getting Rantanen's assist at this price just screams value. The big, burly winger was brought into Dallas last year to be a game breaker in the post season and his 123 points — 43 goals and 80 assists — across 99 career playoff games helped bring just that. His 1.24 points-per-game rate ranks ninth all-time in NHL history. Not ninth among active players. Ninth all-time. This is a player genetically coded to produce in April. Last postseason alone was a masterclass — he set an NHL postseason record by either scoring or assisting on 13 consecutive team goals. When Rantanen is on the ice in a playoff game, pucks through him are currency.

Rantanen continued to bring it all season, helping the Stars fuel one of the top offenses in the league. He has an assist in 70% of ALL home games this season. And during last years playoffs he had an assist in (guess what?) 70% of home games. Dallas led the NHL in power play goals with 71 this season, converting at 28.6% — second in the entire league. Minnesota ranked an exploitable 13th in penalty kill percentage against Dallas specifically, surrendering power play goals at a 64.3% success rate for Dallas in their regular season meetings this year.

In the regular season all-time, Dallas is 56-29-13 against Minnesota and 35-8-7 at home specifically. The Stars have owned this matchup for years, and Rantanen steps into that established advantage in his first full season as a Lone Star.

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3. Travis Konecny Point -125 on Lucky Rebel:

Flyers forward Travis Konecny tries to gain possession of the puck with Sabres defenseman Rasmus Dahlin on his back.

Konecny led the Flyers in points for the fifth straight season with 68 points in 77 games. He finished the year as the engine of the team's best line, centering alongside Christian Dvorak and rookie phenom Porter Martone. Over Philadelphia's final seven games — a 6-1-0 stretch to close the year — that line outscored opponents 5-1 at 5-on-5. Konecny didn't just survive the playoff push; he drove it. Now he gets to play his rival the Pittsburgh Penguins in Round One, and that rivalry is exactly why his point prop looks like an NHL best bet tonight.

The case for Konecny's point prop runs directly through the Pittsburgh crease. The Penguins committed to Stuart Skinner as their Game 1 starter, a goaltender who posted a 2.99 GAA and .885 save percentage this season — numbers that invite pressure from an opportunistic Flyers forward group. And when you have a point in 7 of the last 11 times playing against the Penguins, this shaky goaltending looks like an even better target for Konecny to get on the scoresheet.

Konecny's playoff history has been thin — just one goal and seven assists across 22 prior playoff games, which has been a fair criticism in Philly for years. But context matters: those playoff games came on far inferior Flyers teams, often in losing series where the ice time and line matchups never favored him the way they do now. Tonight he steps onto the ice as the best player on a team playing its best hockey, against a goaltender with legitimate vulnerabilities, on a line producing at an elite rate over the final third of the season. Add it all up to see why this is an NHL best bet.

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