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NHL weekend betting guide: True moneylines for every game

Josh Lavallee / National Hockey League / Getty

You may have noticed the Carolina Hurricanes showing up as a valuable bet lately, even as significant favorites. At 19-6 in their last 25 games, that hasn't necessarily been a bad thing, except on Feb. 25, when they were as high as -450 to beat the Anaheim Ducks.

They took one of their six recent losses that night. The game was a standard hockey betting nightmare for those who made the executive decision to lay the big price singularly or thought they were getting a "lock" to add to a foolhardy parlay.

If you were to back a team at -450, you'd be hoping to get a little more than 80% of the run of play. That's a tall order for any team, but the Hurricanes racked up 53 shots to the Ducks' 16 - or 77%. Carolina accumulated 3.13 expected goals at even strength to Anaheim's 1.23 (72%), and led the five-on-five high-danger chances 17-5 (77%).

Yet John Gibson made 51 saves to help the Ducks to a 3-2 win. While a bet on the Hurricanes lost, it was in keeping with how they've been playing, and why their rating has increased to a point where they show value even as a favorite.

Hurricanes XG% HDC%
Full season 60.1 59.1
Since Jan. 15 60.7 60.8

Their league-leading even-strength metrics are incredibly consistent, legitimizing their healthy rating. It's thus up to the bettor to pick when to bite the bullet and lay a price with a team that won't be near pick'em - let alone an underdog - through most of the remaining games, including playoffs.

Of course, since things are always changing, the Canes got some bad news this week when Andrei Svechnikov went down with a dreaded torn ACL. One of Carolina's "Big Three" scoring forwards, the 22-year old is a top-50 forward in many advanced metrics league-wide. Between now and the Stanley Cup Playoffs, we'll have to see how his injury affects the numbers in the table above.

The recipe

We started the campaign using regular-season point totals as a baseline for rating teams since it's our best measurement. Throughout the campaign, we adjust club ratings using on-ice metrics to remove the cognitive bias of win-loss records, which can be skewed by outliers like special-teams results, poor goaltending performances, and other unreliable events.

The cheat sheet

There are no bad bets at the right price, but how do we know what a good price is?

The following includes my fair price on the games (true moneyline) and the moneyline price I'd need to bet either side. I only need a 1% edge for a favorite if we're getting better than a fair price on the team more likely to win. For the underdog, I'll need 4% or better to make it a bet. For games I project to be closer to a coin flip, a 2.5% edge is enough for a worthwhile wager. I also have a 5% win probability consideration for a team playing in the second game of a back-to-back with travel and a 3% consideration for a team on the second leg of a back-to-back without travel. When it comes to injured players, I do my best to estimate the impact on their team's win probability.

When the betting markets open up the night before, you can compare those prices with our "price to bet" column to see if you're getting any value with either side's moneyline. There's also a possibility that a moneyline moves into a bet-friendly range at some point between market open and puck drop.

DATE GAME TRUE ML PRICE TO BET
March 17 STL@WSH +165/-165 STL +197/WSH -158
CAR@TOR +107/-107 CAR +118/TOR +105
BUF@PHI +108/-108 BUF +119/PHI +102
CBJ@ANA -102/+102 CBJ +109/ANA +112
March 18 COL@DET -118/+118 COL -113/DET +139
WPG@NSH +100/+100 WPG +110/NSH +110
BOS@MIN -134/+134 BOS -129/MIN +158
EDM@SEA -116/+116 EDM -112/SEA +137
CAR@PHI -161/+161 CAR -154/PHI +191
NJD@FLA +129/-129 NJD +152/FLA -124
TOR@OTT -132/+132 TOR -127/OTT +156
MTL@TBL +280/-280 MTL +349/TBL -267
PIT@NYR +105/-105 PIT +116/NYR +105
DAL@CGY +121/-121 DAL +143/CGY -116
VAN@LAK +189/-189 VAN +227/LAK -181
NYI@SJS -123/+123 NYI -119/SJS +145
CHI@ARI +127/-127 CHI +150/ARI -122
March 19 BOS@BUF -124/+124 BOS -119/BUF +146
WSH@MIN -104/+104 WSH +106/MIN +115
CBJ@VGK +218/-218 CBJ +265/VGK -209
NJD@TBL +118/-118 NJD +139/TBL -113
WPG@STL +109/-109 WPG +120/STL +101
NSH@NYR +157/-157 NSH +186/NYR -150
VAN@ANA -116/+116 VAN -111/ANA +136

Matt Russell is a betting writer for theScore. If there's a bad beat to be had, Matt will find it. Find him on Twitter @mrussauthentic.

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