2022/23 NHL Week 18 Betting Report

Welcome to my Week 18 NHL Betting Report, featuring my Gambling Power Rankings, results by category, my best bets, and my best/worst teams to bet on or against. It should be noted that I’m not betting with real money. These are all fictional wagers in a spreadsheet. If you’re betting with real money, you should not be betting on every single game, only the games you like the most. Whereas I’m betting on every game, every over/under, because it provides a complete dataset for macroeconomic analysis. If you followed my weekly reports last season, one upgrade is that I’m now logging alt pucklines for every game, favorites +1.5 goals and underdogs -1.5 goals. Click here to see my Week 17 Betting Report.
 
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My Weekly Profit: $1,453
My Season Profit: $15,736
 
The trade deadline is quickly approaching and some early birds have already snagged a few worms. This is an exciting time of year to be hockey fan, but it’s also a volatile time to bet on hockey games. Blockbuster trades can break at any moment and teams can suddenly decide to bench players they don’t want getting injured, deflating their trade value. Each passing day brings new transfers of wealth from bad teams to good teams. I’m nervous about a collapse of the underdog demographic as more trades happen, but we are likely to see insanely ridiculous prices on favorites in order to compensate.
 
This week we saw 3 moneylines open beyond -400, which is equal to number we saw from Oct 7 to Feb 12. There have been 14 games that eventually surpassed -400 on the closing line, including 5 in the last 8 days. The public seems to like betting heavy favorites, but I won’t touch a -400 moneyline. I’ll either bet the puckline or the dog. Underdogs were a losing bet this week, except longshots (+200 or higher) were a big winner. Teams listed >= +300 were 0-3, but teams from +200 to +299 went 4-1. My confidence in the sustainability of longshots will diminish with each passing trade.
 
The Toronto Maple Leafs accounted for two of those -400 moneylines against Chicago and Montreal (one of those games even closing at -600). Yet I was also unwilling to bet the Habs or Hawks, so laid 2 units on the Leafs puckline in both games and covered. Then they played a back-to-back Sunday against Chicago (who did not play the night before), so I bet the Blackhawks at +225, mostly because I won’t bet any team -295 on short rest unless the other team is also tired. Patrick Kane had a hat trick and Chicago won. The Leafs would have been my team of the week if not for going 0-3 on their over/under.
 
On Friday those Toronto Maple Leafs acquired Ryan O’Reilly from St. Louis, but maybe they should have traded for Kane instead. In the last few weeks I found myself betting the St. Louis Blues to win more often, but only because there was some enticing line value as underdogs. They had won 3 in a row after the Vladimir Tarasenko trade, but now that O’Reilly has also been shipped out (with possibly more trades coming before the deadline), it’s going to take a big line to convince me the Blues are worth betting. Don’t necessarily expect to get any value on Blues opponents any time soon, as oddsmakers had already left this team for dead before the trades.
 
My week actually started off weak, thanks mostly to favorites performing miserably on both the moneyline and puckline, which was responsible for most of my struggles. The only thing keeping my head above water Monday to Thursday was over/under, at least until winning nearly $2,000 on my non-O/U wagers on Friday and Saturday. This was shaping into an excellent week for road teams, both favorites and underdogs, at least until home teams went 15-4 on Saturday and Sunday (forcing me to re-write part of this report’s first draft prepared Friday night).
 

Road teams went 19-14 from Monday to Friday, then home teams went 15-4 on Saturday and Sunday. I have never thought to investigate home-road splits by day of the week, but maybe I should. It makes logical sense that home crowds have a greater impact on the weekend. 🤔 #NHLpicks

— Hockey Economist (@Hockeconomics) February 20, 2023

 
It was home favorites that did the most damage to my own portfolio, most especially when the New York Islanders failed to beat a tired Ottawa Senators team with no goalies. Also Calgary losing to a tired Detroit team cost me another large wager, but at least my profit from road moneylines was more than capable of offsetting my losses on the hosts. I’m not sure why the Buffalo Sabres were only -120 to beat San Jose on Saturday, but I was thrilled to lay down a big bet on my Sabres. Granted, the game was tied mid-way through the 3rd period, so maybe the oddsmakers knew something I didn’t, but thankfully Buffalo pulled off the 4-2 win.
 
 

My Week 18 Results

 
*Note* “Market Return” is based on betting exactly $100 on every outcome.
 

My new over/under method registered a strong performance this week, generating a 10.7% return, thanks largely to overs but still creating profit on both sides. Scoring has been creeping up in the last month, which has been a help to those of you who love betting overs. You would have been better off waiting to bet overs on the closing line, as there seemed to be more money coming in on unders between open and close.  I rarely see anyone pumping unders in my Twitter timeline, despite significantly outperforming overs on the season. It’s definitely a lot more fun to bet an over.
 
This week my new algorithm went 24-12 on the games it liked by at least 0.25 goals, and went 5-10 on those between 0 and 0.25. I did not use all of those unconfident suggestions however, overruling 7 of them, and going 5-2. In reality I could have had a truly outstanding week by betting the other side of all those grey-area matches, but I’m plenty satisfied with the results. I have been able to manufacture profit from both overs and unders in 3 of the last 4 weeks. The spark that started the fire was demoting my previous algorithm to an advisory role, investigating game logs, and making more judgement calls.
 
It was yet another strong week for betting against back-to-backs, pulling a profit for the 9th time in the last 11 weeks. If you bet $100 on the moneyline for each rested team to defeat every tired opponent, you banked $501. If you made that same wager on the puckline -1.5 goals, you could have earned $922. If we sum the last 11 weeks of these two categories, moneylines generated $2,045 and pucklines -1.5 produced $3,505 (both dogs and favorites). Clearly I need to start shifting some of my btb moneyline investment to the puckline.
 
 
My Team of the Week: Dallas Stars, +$813
 
The Dallas Stars went 0-3, but all three of those losses were winners for me (including Columbus +225 Saturday with the Stars on a back-to-back). I’ve been betting against Dallas often lately, but it’s not a matter of believing the team is bad. Quite the opposite actually, I’m a big believer in the core of Jason Robertson, Miro Heiskanen, and Jake Oettinger. The only reason they aren’t soliciting more of my money is because I’m generally turned off by the line price. That had burned me in some previous games, but the chickens came home to roost (in a good way). Also helping boost my Dallas profit was their unders, which went 3-0 (up to 14-2 in the 3rd quarter).
 
Coincidently, the Columbus Blue Jackets were my next best team, thanks in large part to the aforementioned Dallas game. It wasn’t my love of Columbus that compelled me take that bet, I just liked seeing +225 vs a back-to-back (they also covered -1.5 at +500). But my success wasn’t all limited to that one match, picking the correct outcome in 2 of their other 3 games, and going 4 for 4 on their unders. Their overs had been picking up steam, but my algorithm pointed me in the right direction this week, none of the 4 games were within 0.25 goals of the betting total. They also lost Johnny Gaudreau to injury, so don’t expect goal scoring to increase in the meantime.
 
 
My Worst Team of the Week: New York Islanders, -$518
 
The New York Islanders cost me a very large wager when they failed to beat the Ottawa Senators, who were on a back-to-back with a goaltender playing in his first NHL game. The only reason I pushed extra chips into the middle of the table was because the Sens lost both their goalies to injuries, and were rolling out an AHL tandem. But Kevin Mandolese behind a tired team was enough to beat the Islanders, who just loaded up with Bo Horvat ahead of the trade deadline. It’s not a good omen for Islanders fans that they were unable to defeat the Mandolorian and today we learned Matt Barzal is out indefinitely. Playoffs not looking good.
 
The Winnipeg Jets were my next worst team of the week, going 1-2 with me going 0-3 picking the winner. I burned -$250 on their loss to Columbus and another -$250 when they failed to beat a tired New Jersey team. They would have ranked as my worst team of the week if not for their unders going 2-0-1. I haven’t bet a Jets over since Jan 15, taking the under in 12 consecutive games…actually , my algorithm recommended the over for their game Monday against the Rangers, which should be Rittich starting, so the streak has already been snapped.
 
 
My 3 Best Market Bets of Week 18:                  Overall Best Market Bets of Week 18:
 
1) Road favorites moneyline: +$853                     1) Shorting back-to-backs -1.5 PL: +$922
2) Longshots moneyline: +$570                            2) Longshots moneyline: +$680
3) Overs: +$540                                                     3) Shorting back-to-backs ML: +$501
 
My 3 Worst Market Bets of Week 18:              Overall Worst Market Bets of Week 18:
 
1) Home favorites moneyline: -$551                    1) Road underdogs -1.5 goals: -$1,055
2) Road underdogs moneyline: -$395                   2) Unders: -$592
3) Road dogs +1.5: -$100                                      3) Road moneyline: -$443
 
My Best Teams To Bet On In Week 18:             Overall Best Teams To Bet On:
(over/under/hedges not included)                         ($100 ML + $100 PL+1.5 + $100 PL-1.5)
 
1) Boston Bruins: +$502                                       1) Columbus Blue Jackets: +$1,133
2) Toronto Maple Leafs: +$500                            2) Detroit Red Wings: +$974
3) Chicago Blackhawks: +$345                            3) Arizona Coyotes: +$814
 
My Worst Teams To Bet On In Week 18
(over/under/hedges not included)
 
1) Winnipeg Jets, -$500
2) Calgary Flames, -$429
3) New York Islanders, -$413
 
My Best Teams To Bet Against In Week 18:      Overall Best Teams To Bet Against:
(over/under/hedges not included)                          ($100 ML + $100 PL+1.5 + $100 PL-1.5)
 
1) San Jose Sharks, +$464                                      1) Dallas Stars: +$844
2) Dallas Stars, +$436                                            2) Winnipeg Jets: +$753
3) Pittsburgh Penguins, +$422                               3) Calgary Flames: +$642
 
My Worst Teams To Bet Against In Week 18:
(over/under/hedges not included)
 
1) Ottawa Senators, -$550
2) Colorado Avalanche, -$505
3) Detroit Red Wings, -$350
 
Market’s Best Over/Under Bets In Week 18:  
($100 wagers)
 
1) Columbus unders, +$369
2) Dallas Stars, +$282
3) San Jose Sharks, +$266

 

Team By Team Power Rankings

These power rankings are based on the sum of all my bets per team, including where the money was won or lost. Each week my new Power Rankings will be based on all the games in the season, not just what happened this week.