Betting the 2008 Stanley Cup Final
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Thanks to the Detroit Reds Wings’ 4-1 victory over the Dallas Stars on Monday, the NHL Stanley Cup Finals are now set, as the Wings will be facing the Pittsburgh Penguins.

This is one of the more highly anticipated matchups of recent years, especially since Detroit and Pittsburgh did not meet during the regular season. These clubs have met just twice since Sidney Crosby entered the league, and the Red Wings won on both occasions. Detroit shut out Crosby & Co. 2-0 in Pittsburgh last season after winning 3-1 back at home two seasons ago.

Now many experts predicted that these teams would meet in the Finals, and getting a popular matchup like this has actually been rare over the years. This is because the early rounds of the NHL Playoffs have produced more upsets proportionally than any of the other major North American sports. That said however, once we have gotten to the Finals, they have actually been very true to form regardless of the participants. In fact, the finalist with the higher seed has won the Stanley Cup in all seven playoff seasons this decade so far (remember the 2004-05 season was wiped out by the players’ strike), which bodes quite well for the Red Wings this year.

In fact, if you just blindly played the higher seed in every game of the finals since the 2000-01 season, you would have gone 24-14, 63.2 percent, +5.70 units. Now keep in mind we said play the higher seed every game, which is not the same thing as playing the favorite in every contest. If we had taken the latter approach, the record would be 25-13, 65.8 percent, but for only +2.46 units, less than half the amount of continuously betting the higher seed.

Now the dominance of the better teams has been even more evident in the two finals since the strike, the “New NHL” Era. Over the last two playoff season, favorites have gone 10-2 for +5.71 units, while higher seeds are 8-4, +3.55.

Upsets simply do not happen that often in the Stanley Cup Finals, but on the rare occasions that they do, the better teams have historically been a great bet to bounce back next game. Since 2001, if a higher seed is coming off of a loss, it is 11-3 next game for an impressive +9.55 units, while all favorites off of a loss have gone 12-2 for an identical +9.55.

Shifting our focus to totals, the Under is 20-14-4, 58.8 percent since 2001, with a low combined average score of just 4.50 goals per game. Now, the goal of the “New NHL” was to open up the game and increase scoring, but over the last two years, that Under percentage has actually risen to 60.0 percent at 6-4-2. A closer look however reveals that scoring is indeed up, with an average combined score of 5.17 goals per contest, and that the success of the Unders is entirely due to the totals being set higher.

So what do we do in the Stanley Cup Finals this season? Well, if history repeats, it would be safe to play the Red Wings every game, increasing our bets to Best Bet levels if they are coming off a loss. Furthermore, we would use the “New” average of 5.17 as our total gauge, playing the Overs at 5 and the Unders at 5.5.