Ice Hockey Betting
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Ice Hockey Betting

Ice Hockey may not be a universally popular sport like football or cricket, but it enjoys an intense following in Canada and northern Europe. In fact, ice hockey is a key event in the Winter Olympics. If you suddenly find yourself captivated by this fast-paced team sport, Winissimo Casino is the sportsbook you’re looking for! With a wide coverage of ice hockey games from all over the world and a long list of user-centric features, Winissimo Casino & Sportsbook makes for a one-stop ice hockey betting destination for every ice-hockey lover.

Biggest Ice Hockey Leagues

There are numerous ice hockey tournaments and competitions played in a calendar year. The International Ice Hockey Federation (IIHF) is the global administrator of the sport and has 74 members across the world. Most of those members are in North America and Eastern Europe but the sport is flourishing in some unlikely regions as well, like Africa, Latin America, and the Middle East. Ice Hockey is played on both amateur and professional level. Here are the biggest ice hockey leagues you can bet on at Winissimo.

  • World Championships

    The Ice Hockey World Championships are organised every year. In this tournament, the top 16 national teams in the world go against each other for the title for the “World Champion”. The tournament’s rules differ slightly from those of others and require that either player are citizens of the country they represent or that they have played for a certain period of time in case of switched nationalities. This tournament follows a division system and thus, has 12 teams each in Division I and Division II apart from the 16 championship group.

  • Winter Olympics

    Ice Hockey has been a part of the Winter Olympics since the 1920s and it wouldn’t be unfair to say that it has been the biggest highlight at every one of the events since. The IIHF gives eligibility to only those players who are either under the jurisdiction of an IIHF member national association or is a citizen of the country they represent. The Winter Olympics tournament also has several restrictions on player transfer and switching nationalities. Even though many top professional players from the NHL and other professional leagues compete in the Winter Olympics, winning the Olympic gold is considered extremely prestigious for an ice hockey player.

  • National Hockey League

    The National Hockey league or the NHL is undoubtedly the biggest professional ice hockey league/cup competition in the world.  You might recognise it by the names of some the teams participating in it — the Boston Bruins, the New York Rangers, the Toronto Maple Leafs, The Montreal Canadians, the New York Rangers, and the Chicago Blackhawks. And this very tournament is where you’ll find all the star ice hockey players like Patrick Kane, Jonathan Toews, Shea Weber, Alex Ovechkin, Sidney Crosby, and Henrick Lundqvist.

    Held in North America, the NHL sees 30 teams from Canada and the US go head to head in two leagues known as conferences. The Easter Conference has 16 teams while the Western Conference has only 14. When the regular season that runs from early-October to mid-April is over, the 16-team playoffs lead to the Stanley Cup final, which is ice hockey’s equivalent of the World Series.

  • NCAA Ice Hockey Championship

    The NCAA (National Collegiate Athletic Association) is the American collegiate system. It organizes its own extremely popular college football, college ice hockey, college basketball, and the college baseball tournaments. Essentially, you can watch the future stars of ice hockey in action.

  • Other Ice Hockey Leagues

    Apart from these popular ones, there are many other hockey leagues that draw huge audiences and feature big stars. Before you dismiss them, make sure to check out the Kontinental hockey league (KHL), the Swedish Hockey League (SHL), and the American Hockey League (AHL).

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Ice Hockey Betting

With so many leagues to bet on, there are many ways you can show your expertise at Winissimo Casino and Sportbook. We let you select from various exciting bet types and compete with your fellow punters using a host of advanced bet slip features. Here are our most attractive bet types for ice hockey matches.

Match Result (end of regulation)

While placing a Match Result bet, you’re simply betting on the team you think will win the match. Sounds simple right? It isn’t. The bookies throw a wrench in the machine by simply adding a small phrase at the end of the bet name — end of regulation. This is important because a big percentage of hockey games are tied at the regulated sixty minutes of game time. However, you’ll see ties as end results only in exhibition matches. In competitive games, the winner is decided by the Golden Goal rule — the first team to score in overtime wins.

But since bookmakers only consider the match result at the end of the match regulation, even if your team wins in overtime, you’ll lose the bet for drawing after 60 minutes.

Puck Line handicaps

This bet type is also known as “ice hockey betting puck line” and is unique to ice hockey. It’s a variation of spread betting as a point spread is imposed on the favourite and the underdog. The most common puck line value is 1.5. This means the underdog shouldn’t lose by two or more goals or the favourite should win by at least two goals for the punter to win a bet.

Match Result (Including OT)

Recall the previous match result specified above. It tallied results based on their values at the end of the regulated 60 minutes. But scour enough online sportsbooks and you’re sure to find a bookmaker that includes OT in the Match Result bet. This bet is much simpler and easier to predict, and, in turn, profitable for the punter.

League/Tournament Outrights

Unlike the Match Result bet type, the outright bet is placed on the team you think will win a particular tournament. And with so many ice hockey tournaments throughout the year, here are the most popular leagues to look out for: the Ice Hockey World Championships, the Winter Olympics, the NHL, the Divisional titles in the NHL, the Stanley Cup final, the Presidents Trophy, and the various smaller leagues.

Over/Under

Similar to most other sports, an over/under bet requires to predict whether the total number of goals scored in the game will be less than or more than a certain value. This is one of the most strategically challenging bet types since you have to consider many external factors while placing it. Make sure you don’t start with over/under if you’re a newbie.

Ice Hockey Betting Strategies

Ice hockey betting is quite different from its popular cousins, cricket betting and soccer betting. And it’s fundamentally carried from its less-popular-but-better-known cousins like gold betting, tennis betting, and basketball betting. You need to go beyond looking at the difference in betting odds and combine your knowledge with intuition to overcome the odds.

Value in Odds

A bookmaker’s job is to make ice hockey betting on both teams equal by adding a small spread on the favourite team’s odds. However, time and again, you’ll notice a small discrepancy in the bookmaker’s calculations of the favorability of a team over the other. These circumstances give rise to an opportunity for you, in the form of value. You, as a punter, should strive to identify and take advantage of such odds.

Home and Away

Whether a team is playing at home or away matters more than you think it does. After all, the home stadium is the one, many teams have practised numerous times. Moreover, the energy shown by a huge crowd of passionate fans is like having an additional player on the team. So when you see a team with a good home form and great support, don’t bet against it.

Season Stats

When betting for big tournaments like the Stanley Cup, don’t rely too much on the regular season stats. During the season, many teams suffer from a bad travel spot, deal with injuries to key players, or are busy building team chemistry with line changes. But when the big crowds come and bright lights shine, they’re ready to give their absolute best and cement their names in history. This is why you shouldn’t depend heavily on the regular season stats and take into consideration more recent updates on the teams.

Think Like A Coach

Regular and postseason match-ups can be fairly different as coaches and teams make frequent adjustments based on what is happening on the field. Coaches even switch line-ups and defence during the course of a best of seven-game series to exploit the other squad’s weaknesses. Though this happens during regular-season games as well, you’ll see it more often in a short playoff series where each win and loss is significant.

With these strategies in mind, you can check out Winissimo Casino & Sportsbook and start betting on your favourite teams today. And while you’re there, don’t forget to check out our slots, live dealer games, online scratch cards, and a variety of online casinos games. Good luck!