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The biggest event of the NHL season is about to begin as the Edmonton Oilers host the defending champion Florida Panthers on Wednesday for Game 1 of the 2025 Stanley Cup Final. The showdown is a rematch of last year's Final in which the Panthers took a 3-0 series lead and withstood an amazing comeback attempt by the Oilers by posting a 2-1 victory in Game 7 to win the first championship in franchise history.

This Stanley Cup Final rematch is the 11th in back-to-back postseasons in NHL history, the fifth of the expansion era and the first since the Detroit Red Wings and Pittsburgh Penguins faced off for the coveted trophy in both 2008 and 2009. Florida is making its third consecutive appearance in the Final, as it lost to the Vegas Golden Knights in five games in 2023, and giving the Sunshine State a representative in the championship series for a sixth straight postseason as the Tampa Bay Lightning enjoyed a three-year run from 2020-22.

The Oilers are in the Stanley Cup Final for the ninth time since being absorbed from the now-defunct World Hockey Association during the 1979 merger and third since winning their fifth championship in 1990. Edmonton is hoping to deny Florida from joining the 2016-17 Penguins and 2020-21 Lightning as the only teams to win back-to-back Cups since the salary cap era began in 2005-06.

Oilers superstar Connor McDavid was won a plethora of individual awards since being selected with the first overall pick in the 2015 NHL Draft, including five Art Ross Trophies, three Hart Trophies, one Maurice Richard Trophy and the Conn Smythe Trophy last year. One major trophy has eluded him, and the 28-year-old is looking to make his second attempt at capturing Lord Stanley's Cup a successful one.

While backers of the Panthers and Oilers obviously have much invested in the 2025 Stanley Cup Final, the average hockey fans may not have as much interest. But thanks to the surge of sports betting in recent years, they too can get more involved in the series.

If you're not a professional or frequent bettor, fear not. Novices and casuals often get intimidated when it comes to wagering on sports, but the following betting guide will help you learn some of the basics of hockey betting and have even more fun while consuming the 2025 Stanley Cup Final.

Hockey betting basics

One of the first things new bettors always should do when looking to wager on the NHL -- or any other sport -- is peruse the top sportsbooks. They'll often have different sign-up offers that can include things like deposit matches, "bet and get" and "no sweat bets." 

The other benefit to using multiple sportsbooks is the ability to shop around when it comes to lines and odds. For instance, one sportsbook might have the total for the Oilers vs. Panthers series opener at 6 and another may have it at 6.5. It's always a good idea to shop around for the most favorable number when placing a bet.

For new users, taking advantage of sports betting promos provides the opportunity to add bonus bets to your account to get started in hockey betting.

Once you've selected a sportsbook, you need to explore different wagers. Most NHL pages automatically will feature the next upcoming game of the Stanley Cup Final with +/- pricings for wagers. Plus-money prices show how much you would profit on a $100 bet. For example, +110 would profit $110 on a $100 bet. Minus-money prices show how much you need to wager to profit $100. For example, -130 means you need to bet $130 to profit $100. 

 Those prices are attached to three main types of bets:

  • Spread (or puck line): This is the amount the favorite must win by in order to cover. In the NHL, it's usually -1.5, with some exceptions. So, the favorite must win by two or more goals to cash the bet. Therefore, a +1.5 underdog can either win the game or lose by one goal to cover a puck line.
  • Total (over/under): This refers to the total number of goals scored in the game. For example, if the Over/Under is 5.5, six or more combined goals must be scored for that bet to win.
  • Money line: This is a straight-up bet on which team will win. There obviously are no ties in the NHL playoffs (or regular season), so no pushes (refunds) take place on money-line bets. 

Another type of money-line wager is a three-way money-line bet. In the case of the NHL, a bettor can bet on one of the two teams to win in regulation, or they can bet on the game to be tied at the end of regulation (i.e., Oilers +105, Panthers +185, Tie +310). 

For over/under betting in the NHL, it's important to remember that overtime goals count toward the total. In the regular season, the goal awarded in the final score for a shootout winner also counts. For example, if a total is 5 and the game is tied 2-2 after regulation, it ends with a final score of 3-2 after a shootout. The total goals in the game are graded by sportsbooks as 5. The bet then pushes and is refunded. It is not Under 5 goals because the score was 2-2 after three periods. 

NHL prop betting

Other bets that tend to make wagering on the NHL exciting are prop bets. Users can find prop bets on teams, individual players and the game itself.

First up, player props. While NHL player props don't have gaudy point totals like the NBA or yardage totals like the NFL, there still are countless options. One of the more popular player props is the anytime goal scorer, much like an anytime touchdown scorer in the NFL. If that player scores a goal, you win the bet.

Additionally, there are options such as point totals (Connor McDavid Under 1.5 points), shots on goal totals (Matthew Tkachuk Over 2.5 shots), save totals (Sergei Bobrovsky Under 28.5 saves) and more. Assists and blocked shots are a few examples of other common prop bets.

There also are prop bets on individual teams. Those can include which team will score first, individual goal totals for each team and shot totals.

Meanwhile, some of the more interesting prop bets are game prop bets. Users can wager on whether or not the game goes to overtime, the exact score of each period (Oilers 2, Panthers 1), and goal totals for both teams (both teams to score 3+ goals).

NHL parlays

As is the case with many other sports, parlays are a popular type of bet on NHL games. Parlays are a type of bet in which a user packages together multiple bets and must win all of them in order to win the parlay.

Here's an example of a parlay bet when there are multiple games on the daily NHL schedule during either the regular season or playoffs:

The above example carries odds of +807. The user must win all three of those bets to win the parlay, which makes parlays much more difficult to win than individual wagers.

Bettors also can construct same-game parlays in which there are multiple bets on the same game. These types of parlays are the only ones available for the Stanley Cup Final, for obvious reasons. For instance, a bettor could build a same-game parlay on Oilers vs. Panthers that includes:

  • Panthers money line (+110)
  • Oilers Over 3.5 goals (-127)
  • Leon Draisaitl anytime goal-scorer (+130)

Note that each sportsbook has its own formula for SGP odds, another reason to look around at various sports betting apps.

When more than one game is on the schedule on a given day during either the regular season or the playoffs, there are a number of different ways to create parlays across multiple contests, including various prop bets. One example would be picking an anytime goal scorer from each game, which would be a difficult wager to win. 

NHL futures betting

Another popular type of wager is a futures bet, and sportsbooks offer a wide array of them for NHL teams and players. While there aren't many that apply for the 2025 Stanley Cup Final, let's look at some of the more common ones.

Futures bets often are season- or postseason-long wagers that cash if a player or team hits a certain benchmark or wins a certain award. In the NHL, one of the more popular team futures bets is to win the Stanley Cup (Panthers at +550). If that team wins the Stanley Cup Final at the end of the postseason, that wager cashes.

Team futures include Stanley Cup winner, conference winner, over/under for points in the standings, team to make the playoffs and team to win the division. On the individual player side, there are options such as point total, goal total and end-of-season awards.

Betting on who wins the Conn Smythe Trophy is currently available. The award normally goes to a player on the team that wins the Stanley Cup, but last postseason, McDavid became the sixth player in NHL history to win it as a member of the losing team. He enters the 2025 Stanley Cup Final leading all players in scoring with 26 points and is the favorite to win the Conn Smythe again.

How to bet on the Stanley Cup

Sportsbooks will post Stanley Cup odds beginning in the preseason. That's when users can place bets on which team will win it all at the end of the season. Those odds will change throughout the campaign, so users can shop for different odds at different times.

When it comes to how to bet on the NHL Stanley Cup Final or the playoffs in general, it isn't much different from betting on regular-season games. Perhaps the biggest differences include the ability to bet on each individual series (Oilers to defeat the Panthers) or the Conn Smythe Trophy winner, which is given to the playoff MVP.

When wagering on series winners, users also can bet on the exact outcome (Oilers to defeat the Panthers in six games). That bet only cashes if the team wins the series in that exact number of games.

Live betting

As is the case with so many other sports, users can live bet on NHL games, which just means betting on a game while it's in progress. Throughout the course of the game, sportsbooks will post live numbers on the spread, money line and totals, among other things. Some of the more common live bets include money lines and totals.

It sometimes can be good to live bet if users want to get a feel for how the game is playing out before placing a wager. For instance, if a team has a couple of key injuries or just made a coaching change, users may want to see how a team reacts to that on the ice before placing a bet.

Tips and advice for betting on the NHL

The NHL can be very unpredictable, so just laying the -1.5 spread with every favorite generally is not a good strategy. Here are a few basic betting tips for hockey. 

Verify the starting goaltender: This is more difficult to do during the regular season and easier in the playoffs, when each team's No. 1 goalie is guaranteed to be in the crease. However, in the case of injury or poor play in previous games, the backup can get the start, so always double-check before betting on a game. When doing so, see if the odds match recent games with that goalie.

Check injury reports for top players: Staying updated on NHL players' injuries is crucial before betting on any hockey game. That is even more important when it comes to the best goal scorers on each team and players on the top power-play unit. It's also a good idea to follow beat reporters on social media for injury context. Hockey players are among the toughest athletes on the planet and often will play through injuries if possible. Knowing if key players are at less than 100% could be insightful and not fully reflected in the odds.

Rest advantages: Monitor the schedule for spots where a team has a significant rest advantage over its opponent. In the regular season, a team could be concluding a back-to-back while its opponent was idle the previous day. A club could be playing its fourth game of the week and the other could be playing only its second. When it comes to the playoffs, you should compare how much time each team has had off between series. 

It's difficult for sportsbooks to constantly keep track of these things in addition to injuries and lineup changes, especially in the regular season. It's often early, sharp money after lines open (price discovery) that lets books know they may not have accounted for something like rest advantages.