What Are the Betting Markets in the NHL? – Philadelphia Sports Nation

Betting on hockey is quite exciting, and it’s becoming very popular in Pennsylvania sports betting.

This is especially due to the continued expansion of sports betting in the country since its legalization in 2018.

Wagering on your favorite NHL teams or a game you are watching allows you to get a stake in the game and makes things much more interesting.

You will also have a chance to make a few bucks if you get your bets right or simply test your knowledge of the game.

However, there are a few terms you will come across, and these are mainly the various betting options available in the NHL.

In this guide, we’ll walk you through the various betting markets to help you choose the most suitable type of bet, depending on your strategy.

Moneyline Betting

This is the simplest and most popular form of betting in the NHL, as well as other sports. It involves choosing the team you think is going to win outright, regardless of the margin of victory. The odds will always give you an idea of who is considered the favorite. The stronger team usually has odds negative odds, while the underdog usually has positive odds. 

For example, in a game between the Philadelphia Flyers and Seattle Kraken, you can have odds of -120 for the Flyers and +150 for the Kraken. This means that you will need to place $120 to make a profit of $100 on Flyers, while a $100 bet will win you +150 on Kraken.

Puck Line Betting

Puckline betting is unique to hockey, but it’s much like points spread in the NFL and handicap betting in soccer. It’s actually quite similar to the latter, as it tries to even the playing field by handing one team a handicap of -1.5 goals and the other an advantage of +1.5 goals. 

This means that if you want to bet on the favorite, they need to win by two goals for you to win your bet. And for the underdog, they can lose by one goal, and you still win your bet. The best thing about this type of bet is that it significantly raises the odds of betting on the favorite.

Over/Under Betting (Total Goals)

Totals betting simply involves wagering on the total number of goals you think will be scored by the two teams (combined). The sportsbook will usually pick an over/under line in this type of bet. 

For example, it can be set at 5.5 goals. If you bet on the over, you will need the two teams to score six or more goals in the game, and vice versa. Sportsbooks usually offer three of four lines, depending on the game.

Prop Betting

Proposition betting, or simply prop betting, is a much more exciting form of betting as it deviates from the traditional. In this type of betting, you get to focus on specific events instead of the game in its entirety. This makes watching the game much more exciting, as every second matters.

Prop betting can generally be divided into player, team, and game props. In player props, you can wager on individual players using things such as goals, assists, shots on goal, blocked shots, etc. In team props, you get to focus more on the performance. Here, you can wager on the first team to score a goal, total power play opportunities, or total penalty minutes. There are then game props that focus on game situations that don’t generally involve the eventual scores. The most common is whether the game will go to overtime, but others include winning various periods, both teams scoring in the first half, and the type of first goal.

Futures Betting

You can check out NHL futures if you want to focus more on the league than a particular game. These types of bets generally involve betting on events that will take place a few months or weeks from the day of the bet.

The most popular bets here include conference winners and Stanley Cup winners.

Although these types of bets take a long time to mature, you get huge odds, and winning such a bet is quite fulfilling.

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