Mike Cammalleri's New Jersey Devils are among the NHL leaders in Corsi rating this season. (Photo credit: tsyp9 / Foter / CC BY-SA)
A Sports Interaction rep answers a few questions for us each week about handicapping hockey betting.
Here’s this week’s Q&A:
When handicapping hockey, how much time and effort should bettors put into evaluating each team’s power play and penalty killing units?
Although handicapping special teams is important in any successful hockey betting, what bettors must first master is handicapping each team’s ability when skating five-on-five.
The newest stat to accurately gauge even-strength play is Corsi, named after St. Louis Blues goaltending coach Jim Corsi.
Corsi measures offensive zone puck possession and scoring chances during five-on-five play and since you can’t score if you don’t have the puck, it’s a good tool to evaluate teams.
As a general rule, the larger the Corsi divide between Team A and Team B, the larger the disparity in offensive ability. Any team that has a Corsi percentage better than 55 percent is exceptional.
This was supposed to be the year the Edmonton Oilers finally took the next step and contended for a playoff spot but they’ve dropped 11 straight games and look to be falling apart at the seams. Is there any light at the end of the tunnel this year for their betting supporters?
In terms of battling for a playoff spot, I’d like to say there is light at the end of the tunnel for Oilers backers, but that’s been said for many years now and the light is no brighter.
However, those backing the Oilers in hockey betting need to block out the media buzz and focus on the numbers.
They may have lost 11 straight, but they’ve covered the puckline (+1.5 goal spread) in seven of the 11 games, so the opportunity for a return is there if you know where to look.
The NHL has been ruled by the Western Conference over the past few years. Has the balance of power shifted a bit back to the mean this year when comparing the East and West? Are Western teams in general still a strong bet against Eastern teams?
It really depends how you gauge it. On the surface, the Eastern Conference is currently 66-58-16 against the Western Conference, but if you remove the top four teams — Pittsburgh, New York Islanders, Montreal and Tampa Bay — that number drops to 43-48-12.
I think it’s safe to say that the upper echelon of the East has caught up to the West, but the lower levels are still struggling to match the toughness and style of play employed on the West Coast.
On the whole, I’d say that Western teams are being underpriced when facing Eastern Conference clubs — at least for now. So in that regard there could be value in the West as those teams’ odds could be seeing a bit of an East Coast bias based on quick starts.