NHL betting strategies and a look at the 2018-19 NHL season



A preview for the NHL season with tips for betting Stanley Cup futures, as well as single-game wagering strategies.

Preview and betting tips for the upcoming NHL season

Without question the story of the 2017-2018 NHL season was the Vegas Golden Knights. As an expansion team they initially were given no shot of doing anything. This was reflected in their future betting odds which was as high as 500-1 to win the Stanley Cup and 250-1 to win the Western Conference. But when setting the team’s odds, bookmakers didn’t realize that the 2017 entry draft was different than in prior years. The league allowed teams to protect only 8 players including one goalie, as well as first and second year professionals. And all players with no movement clauses had to be protected. Consequently, several good players were left unprotected and Vegas was quick to gobble them up. Some bettors realized this before bookmakers, resulting in a huge loss position for Vegas books should the team win it all. Vegas chose Marc Andre-Fleury who had many good years in Pittsburgh as their goalie along with high scoring forwards such as Jonathan Marchessault, William Karlsson, Reilly Smith and James Neal. And defensively they had several decent players among others. As a result of those choices Vegas became a high scoring powerhouse and Marc Andre-Fleury had the best season of his career, backed up by Malcolm Subban, who proved he could start in any game necessary.Vegas went on to win their division and eventually represented the Western Conference in the Stanley Cup. Vegas won the first game of the Cup, but then lost the next four straight to eventual Stanley Cup winner, Washington. The question on most bettors’ minds is whether Vegas can repeat.

Vegas Golden Knights Stanley Cup  oddsBookmakers believe they can as the team is only 12/1 to win the Stanley Cup, 11/2 to win their conference and 11/4 to win their division.  Vegas has arguably improved offensively getting Max Pacioretty and Paul Stastny while losing James Neal and David Perron. Otherwise the team is similar, and one only expect they’ll improve with a full year working together under their belt. One of their key players from last year, Nate Schmidt will miss the first 20 games of the season for taking performance enhancing drugs.

The other story of 2017-2018 was the huge decline in performance by several teams, but particularly by the Chicago Black Hawks, Edmonton Oilers and Montreal Canadiens. All three teams were expected to be Cup contenders, but failed miserably. Despite recording 105 points in the 2016-17 season and having some of the most recognized players in the league like Patrick Kane and Jonathan Toews, Chicago struggled home with the third worst record in the conference and never contended. Their goaltending was atrocious, and the star players started showing their age, which resulted in injuries and lack of performance. This may have been hinted at in the 2016-17 playoffs when they were knocked out in the first round by Nashville, but no one could have expected that big of a decline last year.

Edmonton was among the favorites to win the Cup last year due to up and coming stars like Connor McDavid and Leon Draisaitl, but injuries, poor goaltending and an inability to get any cohesion found Edmonton just two points ahead of Chicago in the standings and the fourth worst record in the conference. And the Montreal Canadiens, who won the Atlantic Division in 2016-17 just plain stank last year. They showed that as good as Carey Price is as a goaltender, he can’t carry a lackluster offense and dreadful defense. Montreal lost their best player in Max Pacioretty this year and picked up Max Domi, who has proven to be very mediocre as his replacement. The Canadiens finished 3rd last in both the Atlantic Division and the Eastern Conference last year and may be worse this year. So, the question is whether these teams can turn things around. The bookmakers say no.  Chicago is 40/1 to win the Cup, Edmonton is 25/1 and Montreal is 75/1, with only Vancouver, Arizona, Detroit and Ottawa sporting worse Stanley Cup odds.

Naturally teams can and do improve for seemingly no reason, while others get worse, but there are nine teams that look like they stand out above the rest. Pittsburgh has almost exactly the same team as they did the last few years and with Sidney Crosby, Evgeni Malkin, Phil Kessel and Connor Sheary leading the way, they must be considered. The same holds true for the Boston Bruins and Tampa Bay Lightning who are loaded with star players and are always challengers. And the San Jose Sharks, Nashville Predators, Washington Capitals, Vegas Golden Knights and Winnipeg Jets all have teams that can win it all. The one team that is most improved on paper seems to be the Toronto Maple Leafs.

Toronto Maple Leafs oddsIt seems every year fans in Toronto hope that the new team can break the 50+ year Stanley Cup drought, but in the 2018-19 season they have a real chance to win it all and the odds reflect that as they are co-favorites to win the Stanley Cup.  Auston Matthews had a tremendous rookie season and will only get better and young stars Mitch Marner, William Nylander, Zach Hyman and Nazem Kadri are on the rise. And Toronto made huge strides in the offseason by signing John Tavares, who has been among the best players in the league his entire career. He also excelled in pre-season. The Leafs won’t lose anything with the loss of James van Riemsdyk as Tavares is taking his place. And most importantly Toronto has found a reliable and consistent goaltender in Frederick Anderson. Toronto opens the season tonight against Montreal.

So what strategies should be employed to win on the games? I asked a friend who makes a good living betting only hockey who was happy to give his opinions.

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NHL Future Betting Tips

Like in any sport, you can never look at early results to predict the rest of the season. Teams get off to slow starts and bookmakers over react to that start. Bettors need to remember when betting on teams to win their conference or the Cup that the team only needs to make the playoffs and the post season is a whole new game. Some of my biggest NHL futures wins were on teams who I knew would turn things around, squeaked into the playoffs after making a big run to end the year and then went all the way to take it all. Bettors also need to look at the remaining schedules. A team may be just outside the final playoff spot, but have an incredibly easy schedule for the last month of the year, while other teams that appear to be well on their way to the playoffs have a bear of a schedule to end it. Those are the times when one can bet on the team that is outside the playoff spot and make a fortune. 

Stanley Cup  bettingNHL Betting Strategies

Here are five tips for regular season, single game betting:

1.  The first thing I tell anyone is to stay away from betting on the puck line (Canadian line) for big favorites. A game with a money line of -350 will often result in a puck line of -1.5 -180 or similar. Many bettors jump on the puck line because they don’t want to lay the big juice on the money line, but the NHL mostly finishes with a team winning by a goal. And big favorites tend to play easier against lesser teams to save their energy for the next game. They’ll usually win the game, but hoping it will be 2 goals or more is just not worth it. At the same time, it’s hard to ever justify taking a team like Ottawa against Tampa Bay.  If you can’t justify betting the money line or total, then stay away from the game.

2.  The second thing I tell people is never to bet on a team playing on back to back nights, particularly if they have far to travel. Teams tend to lay down on the second night and they often play back-up goalies. Hockey is a grueling sport and it’s tough to stay fresh two nights in a row. If a team is playing back to back I usually look at betting the opposing team or more likely the UNDER in the game. I find that teams load up on defense on the 2nd night of a back to backer and the result is fewer shots and fewer goals.

3.  Underdogs on the road have more value than favorites in close games. Hockey is one sport where being at home isn’t a huge advantage, yet bookmakers always give at least 50 cents to a team for playing on home ice. The result is that you often get odds of 3 to 2 or better on a team that should likely only be a pick ‘em and in the long run betting mostly on those teams will result in a profit. I recall for one week I ran a test and bet every road underdog whose odds were between +120 and +160 and the result was a decent profit. I believe I won around 48% of the bets, but due to the odds, won good coin. I didn’t continue that because it’s not true handicapping and I prefer to rely on my skills, but it proved to me that home favorites are a bad bet.

4.  Take advantage of early trends on totals. When I first started betting on NHL games teams scored on average around 7 goals a game. Then the league changed rules, teams got more defensive with the neutral zone trap and totals steadily declined. Yet sports books were very slow to adapt. I believe it was the mid-1990s and seeing the trend, the only bets I made were at Bowman’s International on the UNDER on games involving teams that weren’t offensive powerhouses and I won almost every bet. The totals kept dropping throughout the year from 7 to 6.5 to 6 and it was only near the end of the year I saw 5.5 totals. It was only then I stopped betting totals, but it was my best year ever. And last year I saw the trend move upward but again bookies were slow to react. So, I won fairly consistently early on betting OVER 5 or 5.5 on a game where it was clear the totals should have been closer to 7. Monitor the first couple of weeks and beat the trend before bookies adapt.

5.  Never chase or get greedy. I love in-game betting, but I see too many people who bet live hoping to get back losses and it never works out. Also, people get greedy. They bet the Rangers before the start who go up 2-0 in the game. They get greedy and bet more and more on the Rangers thinking it’s easy money and hoping to pad their profits only to see the lead evaporate. I know because I was one of those people who bet that way when in-game betting started. But now I treat in-game bets as separate animals from pre-game bets and will only wager on it if I see value. There tends to be less value as the game goes on.

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Hockey Props

I generally avoid props but there are two prop bets I will wager on occasionally because the value is too good to pass up. These are team to win the opening faceoff and time of the first goal. Most bettors probably equate betting the opening faceoff to betting on the coin flip in football, but that’s not true. The starting lines are posted on many sites like dailyfaceoff.com and when watching on TV they will tell you which players will be taking the faceoff. And some centers are just better at winning faceoffs than others. Most sites like ESPN or NHL.com have FOW% (faceoff won percentage) for each player and you will often see one player with a 65% FOW% versus another player with a 42% FOW%. Obviously, the player who wins 2/3 of his faceoffs is the better bet, yet almost every site which offers that prop has the line -115 for both sides. It’s just too good to pass up. And for time of first goal, teams always want to get off strong, particularly in games involving two high scoring teams, so betting on a goal before 10 minutes has proven profitable.

Read insights from Hartley Henderson every week here at OSGA and check out Hartley's RUMOR MILL!


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