NHL DFS DraftKings picks for November 2: Colorado stacks and salary savers

Nathan MacKinnon, Artturi Lehkonen and Martin Necas are our first stack. Seth Jones is the defenseman we want most at his salary, and Anton Lundell is the center who makes the expensive pieces fit. Monday’s four-game DraftKings NHL slate begins at 7 p.m. ET. Colorado has the strongest attacking case; Calgary offers the cheaper route to a full line without sacrificing every other position.

Game	Start (ET)
Vegas at Boston	7 p.m.
Detroit at Florida	7 p.m.
Colorado at Chicago	8 p.m.
Calgary at San Jose	9 p.m.

NHL DFS picks at a glance

• Top stack: Nathan MacKinnon $9,500 + Artturi Lehkonen $5,700 + Martin Necas $6,700.
• Tournament alternative: Matthew Tkachuk $7,700 + Sam Reinhart $7,000 + Seth Jones $5,200.
• Value stack: Joel Farabee $5,100 + Mikael Backlund $3,700 + Matt Coronato $4,600.
• One-off scorers: David Pastrnak $7,800; Macklin Celebrini $9,000.
• Salary relief: Anton Lundell $3,900; Martin Pospisil $2,700; Zayne Parekh $3,300.
• Goalie lean: MacKenzie Blackwood $8,400 if he starts. Jeremy Swayman $7,800 is the tournament alternative, also pending confirmation.

Top stack: Colorado’s first line

MacKinnon / Lehkonen / Necas: $21,900. Colorado leads the league at 4.21 goals per game and visits a 4-9-1 Chicago team. That is the matchup we are most willing to spend on. Colorado’s Monday preview supports the attacking environment, not a guarantee of another five-goal night.

MacKinnon has 24 points and 57 shots in 14 games. Necas has 18 points and 30 shots over the same span. MacKinnon’s volume gives this stack a foundation beyond finishing luck; Necas adds another way to collect points from the same scoring sequences. Official Colorado statistics.

Lehkonen is the salary hinge at $5,700. His 12 goals on 28 shots work out to 42.9% shooting, a rate we should not expect him to maintain. We want the placement beside this offense, not an extrapolation of that conversion rate. The Avalanche’s October 29 breakdown counted seven of his first 10 goals from high-danger areas. Those chances help explain the production without making it sustainable at its current pace.

Cale Makar at $7,500 is the premium extension, but adding him to all three forwards makes the rest of the roster thin. We prefer Jones in the main construction. Devon Toews at $4,100 is a cheaper Colorado add-on with 13 points in 14 games, though he is not a like-for-like substitute for Makar’s offensive role.

Tournament alternative: Florida’s power play

Matthew Tkachuk / Sam Reinhart / Seth Jones: $19,900. This is a special-teams stack rather than a claim that all three skate together at even strength. Jones quarterbacks the first power play and has 11 power-play points. That shared scoring route is the appeal. Florida’s Jones report.

Matthew has 20 points in 14 games, Reinhart has seven goals and 43 shots, and Jones has 18 points with 37 shots. The combination pairs a distributor, a shooter and a defenseman who can participate in the same goal. Official Florida statistics. Reinhart is center-eligible on this slate, an important difference when comparing him with similarly priced wings.

The risk is obvious: Florida can score without this trio sharing the points, and a quiet whistle removes some of the correlation. Florida is our preferred change of direction when we do not want another Colorado-heavy lineup.

Value stack: Calgary’s latest top line

Farabee / Backlund / Coronato: $13,400. Calgary’s latest published lineup placed these three together, with Pospisil centering the second line and Parekh on the third defense pair. Those are the most recent assignments, not confirmed Monday combinations.

Farabee has 15 points and 33 shots in 14 games; Coronato has 14 points and 32 shots. Backlund has 33 shots in 12 games despite only five points. Official Calgary statistics. His $3,700 salary buys into the same line without paying for a hot scoring total. The full trio costs $8,500 less than Colorado’s, enough to make a second premium skater realistic.

San Jose’s two goalies have save percentages around .900: Yaroslav Askarov .900 and Alex Nedeljkovic .899. Official San Jose statistics. That makes Calgary worth considering, but neither figure turns a modest offense into an automatic smash. Coronato is our preferred single piece when a three-player Flames commitment feels too aggressive.

Best one-offs and salary-saving forwards

David Pastrnak, $7,800: 50 shots and 19 points in 15 games. He costs $1,700 less than MacKinnon and $1,200 less than Celebrini, making him the easier premium wing to add to a cheaper stack. Official Boston statistics. The attraction is his own shooting, not a requirement that you also roster two Bruins.

Macklin Celebrini, $9,000: 52 shots and 16 points in 13 games, with an average of 22:40 on the ice. He is the direct expensive-center alternative to MacKinnon. Calgary’s available goalies have struggled so far, but Celebrini still needs a substantial result to justify giving up $5,100 of salary versus Lundell.

Anton Lundell, $3,900: The 42 shots in 14 games matter more to us than chasing his last-game hat trick. Three shots per game is meaningful volume at this salary. Florida’s latest published alignment had him on the third line, so this is a shooting-and-price selection, not a claim that he owns the first power play.

Martin Pospisil, $2,700: A practical way to afford the Colorado trio. He has 24 shots and six points in 14 games while averaging 13:43. The latest second-line assignment gives the salary punt a clearer route to offense, but the limited minutes are why he remains a supporting piece rather than a core scorer.

Defense: Jones first, Parekh for relief

Seth Jones, $5,200 is our favorite balance of price and opportunity. His 24:52 average ice time and power-play role give him more than one way to contribute. At $2,300 below Makar, he also preserves an actual forward ceiling elsewhere.

Zayne Parekh, $3,300 has 25 shots and five points in 14 games, with a 17:34 average workload. That is a modest offensive profile, but the salary is modest too. We are using him to keep the Colorado forwards together, not pretending his current output matches Jones. Toews, $4,100 is the more productive alternative when another $800 is available.

Goalies: our preferences, not announced starters

No goalie below is presented as a confirmed Monday starter. The morning team reports reviewed for this edition had not named these starters.

Top choice if starting: MacKenzie Blackwood, $8,400. He is 7-3 with a 2.73 goals-against average and .897 save percentage. The case is Colorado’s chance to control the game, not elite early-season save efficiency. A relatively quiet Chicago attack could also limit his save total.

Tournament choice if starting: Jeremy Swayman, $7,800. His .912 save percentage and 2.35 GAA are stronger than Blackwood’s early numbers. Vegas creates a tougher assignment and more potential save work. We would use him in builds without Vegas attackers rather than combine competing outcomes.

Cheaper alternative if starting: Adin Hill, $7,600. He saves $800 versus Blackwood, but his .891 save percentage and a road matchup with Boston make that a real trade-off. Official Vegas statistics. We prefer finding salary at forward or defense rather than forcing the cheapest goalie.

Example DraftKings lineup: $50,000

This construction spends on Colorado’s first line, uses Lundell’s shooting to save at center and keeps Jones on defense. The goalie slot assumes Blackwood starts; it is not a starter announcement.

Slot	Player	Team	Salary
C	Nathan MacKinnon	COL	$9,500
C	Anton Lundell	FLA	$3,900
W	Artturi Lehkonen	COL	$5,700
W	Martin Necas	COL	$6,700
W	Matt Coronato	CGY	$4,600
D	Seth Jones	FLA	$5,200
D	Zayne Parekh	CGY	$3,300
G	MacKenzie Blackwood (if starting)	COL	$8,400
UTIL	Martin Pospisil	CGY	$2,700
Total			$50,000

The weak point is the cheap Calgary pair. Pospisil and Parekh make the expensive stack possible, but both can finish quietly. For a less top-heavy build, the Calgary line leaves room for Pastrnak and a stronger second defenseman. Do not automatically add a Chicago skater opposite Blackwood just to make a game stack.

DraftKings salaries and eligibility are from the supplied November 2 four-game slate. Season statistics are through the games completed before Monday morning; they describe past performance, not tonight’s projections.