NHL Betting: How to Deal With the Most Popular Betting Variations?

The National Hockey League (NHL) is North America’s premier professional ice hockey league. Apart from this, it is the biggest and the most famous ice hockey league across the whole world. That is why it is not a surprise that it is also a very requested betting market. To tell the truth, NHL betting can be extremely beneficial and exciting if you know how to achieve the desired result. Thus, the main aim of the given article is to present the most useful information on NHL gambling.

Basics of NHL Betting Explained

So, the NHL consists of many teams that have to play many games over a single season. That is why it is possible to firmly state that every gambler will be able to find an opportunity to place his favorite wager on a hockey event. What is more interesting, NHL betting implies both general betting variations and ones that are peculiar for the given sport only. Thus, let us get familiar with all of them.

Understandably, Outright betting is the most popular market when it comes to gambling on any competition, and the NHL is not an exception. However, the NHL is a peculiar tournament, which is represented by the fact that it is possible to place numerous outright wagers here. First of all, we can speak of Division Outright gambling. Here, the NHL is divided into two Conferences, each of which, in its turn, is split into two divisions. To be more exact, it is possible to winners of the Metropolitan Division (the Eastern Conference), the Atlantic Division (the Eastern Conference), the Central Division (the Western Conference), and the Pacific Division (the Western Conference). Although divisional trophies seem to be the minor ones in the NHL, a team has to play 82 games in order to win a trophy.

As it has already been mentioned, the NHL includes two conferences. Thus, it is possible to predict winners in each of them. For this, it is necessary to predict which of the top eight teams will manage to be more successful than its opponents. The fate of the trophies is decided in playoffs that are quite similar to those of the NBA. To explain, the playoffs follow a knockout format, while a winner of each stage is decided according to a best-of-seven series. Here, it is possible to bet either on the overall winner or at a winner of a particular series of games.

The final NHL Outright market is represented by who will win the Stanley Cup. To tell the truth, it is the most illustrious trophy in the world of hockey. That is why this best-of-seven game series gathers a great attention of professional sportsmen, hockey fans, and numerous gamblers. In order to benefit from this betting variation, it is necessary to simply guess which of the conference winners will win. The best thing here is that numerous bookmakers offer quite attractive odds for the Outright market.

So, it was a comprehensive guide to NHL Outright betting. Fortunately for ordinary gamblers, it is not the only way to deal with betting on the given tournament. The next betting variation to speak of is Correct Score gambling. From its name, it should be clear that you have to precisely predict the final score of a single match. When it says Correct, it means that no concessions are allowed. Even if you placed a wager on the Montreal Canadiens to defeat the Red Wings 5:1, and the final outcome was 5:2 that was very close, you would not obtain any benefits. On the other hand, if the game ended 5:1 as it was predicted, you would be able to rely on corresponding returns.

The following betting variation is well familiar for bettors who are well aware of football gambling because we will discuss Over/Under betting. If you are not, there is nothing difficult here. In order to win with this betting variation, it is necessary to predict an approximate number of goals scored in a single match. It is approximate because you need to guess whether the total amount will be higher or lower than a certain figure. For instance, it is possible to place such wagers as Over 6.5, Under 5.5, and so on. Let us imagine that you placed an Over 6.5 wager on the game mentioned above. For this case, the final score of 5:2 and more will be winning, while any score where fewer goals will be score will result in a loss. Very useful tips here are to consider teams’ previous performance in order to understand whether they tend to score many goals or not.

Here, we have come to the most straightforward kind of betting represented by the Match Result. In hockey, however, we should be aware of a peculiarity meaning there are two different variations of Match Result gambling. First of all, let us consider Match Result betting at the end of regulation i.e. the end of the regular time period, which is 60 minutes. It should be mentioned here that there are no draws in ice hockey. If the regulation time ends in a draw, the competing teams have to play overtime. However, the given betting variation provides you with the possibility to bet on a draw and benefit from it. If you bet on a draw and the regulation time ends in a draw, you will obtain your benefits despite what will happen in the overtime.

As you can guess, there is also Match Result betting including overtime. In this case, you need to correctly predict a winner of a game whether at the end of regulation or in the overtime.

Finally, it is necessary to tell about NHL handicapping. In fact, this betting variation is quite popular for many kinds of sport, and hockey is not an exception. The only peculiar moment here is that it has a different name when applied to the NHL – Betting Puck Line. Despite a different name, the general principles are all the same. Here, there are usually 1.5 puck line handicaps that can be given both to favorites (negative puck lines) and underdogs (positive puck lines).

Conclusion

So, this was the basics of NHL betting. This information is enough to start betting but is not enough for you to consistently benefiting from it. For this, it is necessary to gain the relevant experience and betting skills, which can be done with the help of regular practice only.