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Betting Guide
NHL “Race to 3 Goals” is a prop bet you can make on every single NHL game. The prop is quite simple and just how it sounds, who will get to three goals first? A very simple prop bet that can be hard to predict. Sometimes a team will jump out to two goals and then struggle to get the third, sometimes a team will erupt in the second period after being shut out in the first; it’s just one of those bets that is the perfect combination of skill and luck. A ton of fun to bet on.
You can make this bet on pre-season games, NHL regular season games and also in playoff games.
However the “Race to 3 Goals” NHL bet is a rather rare bet that you can only make at a few sportsbooks. There are a lot of great websites that you can bet on the NHL, but only a few who offer this bet. A shame really because it is a lot of fun and something that the sportsbook should easily be able to add. Hopefully, as its popularity grows, so will its availability at the sportsbooks.
In this article I’m going to cover what the “Race to 3 Goals” bet is and offer to you the sportsbooks where you can actually place that bet.
I’ll also talk about “Race to 3 Goals” Betting Strategies that I use to make money on this bet.
This play is a good one so let’s get into the meat of the article and find out more about the Race to Three Goals.
Where To Bet Race to 3 Goals:
America: Unfortunately, “Race to 3 Goals” is a prop bet not available at any sportsbooks accepting Americans currently. However I’d like to suggest Bovada who at least have a good variety based on that bet. They have alternate goals over and under, both teams to score, margin of victory and the highest scoring period.
Canada: Sports Interaction is the best place for Canadians to bet on Race to 3 Goals. Along with Race to 3 Goals, they offer Race to 2 Goals or Race to 4 Goals. Sports Interaction also offer various other goal bets such as team totals, goals in a particular period, and various props based on both of those.
Everywhere Else: The Race to 3 goals bet is available at Bet365 Sportsbook. They also offer game total bets, whether the game total will be odd or even, team to score first or last bets and the highest scoring period. This site offers odds on the NHL throughout the season and playoffs.
What is the Race to 3 Goals Bet?
The Race to 3 Goals bet in NHL is a bet with 3 separate outcomes.
Let’s take a random regular season game where it’s a 50/50 matchup – the Dallas Stars at the Vegas Golden Knights.
The bets you can make on “Race to 3 Goals” is:
Stars win the race: $100 profits $130. (2.30 odds)
Knights win the race: $100 profits $125. (2.25 odds)
Neither win the race: $100 profits $350. (4.50 odds)
What you are betting on is that a team scores three goals first. So you’re betting that the Dallas Stars will score 3 goals before the Vegas Knights do for example. The final score or the result of the game doesn’t matter at all – all that matters is that the Stars score 3 goals before the Knights do.
Or you can bet the “Neither”. What that means is that NEITHER team scores 3 goals in that game. It’s hockey and goals are a plenty especially empty netters – so it’s a risky bet which gives you back a good return.
Normally, “Race to 3 Goals” doesn’t include overtime or shootout so as long as both teams score 2 or less goals by the end of regulation, you’d win the bet if it includes “Neither” – and lose the bet if you picked one of the teams.
Common NHL Race to 3 Goals Questions:
Does the Race to 3 Goals Include overtime/shootout?:
That’s something you’ll have to check at the online sportsbook you’re betting at just to make sure. It’ll either be displayed on the page where you are betting or be buried in their rules.
Normally however, Race to 3 goals only factors in regulation time and does NOT factor in the overtime or shootout periods of hockey. It’s only the first 3 periods that should matter.
Why 3 goals?
Three goals is the most commonly scored amount of goals in the NHL history. The most common outcome in NHL games is a 3-2 final score which has occurred just over 10% of the time in NHL history.
It is a good rule of thumb that your team needs at least three goals to win a game as teams who score less have than three goals lose far more often than they win.
How to Bet Race to 3 Goals:
Bovada: Like I said above you can’t bet on “Race to 3 Goals” here however for all props, click on “Hockey” on the sidebar and that brings up todays games. On the right side of each game it will say “+16 bets” or “+17 bets”. Click on that and it opens up all bets for that game you can make.
Sports Interaction: Select “Hockey” on the left sidebar then “NHL”. Then at the very top right of this section where it says “Main Event” above todays date, click that then scroll down and you will see Race to 3 goals as well as Race to 2 goals and Race to 4 goals.
Bet365 Sportsbook: Click “Hockey” on left sidebar and NHL is listed at the top. Under “Props” one of the options is “Race to 3 Goals” and you can just click on that and it lists all of the games and the odds for Race to 3 Goals on them.
Race to 3 Goals Betting Strategy:
I’ve found the best way to bet on a “Race to 3 Goals” bet is to go with the “Neither”. I think if you’re going to bet a team to win the race to 3 goals it’s a risky one and you’d be best just betting on a particular team to win or a handicap for better odds and less variance.
Of course, the match-up is very important when betting this. You don’t want to bet “Neither” when it is two of the top offenses in the league or anything like that. You have to find the right match-up.
I’d only bet the “Neither” and it’s when there are two tight teams – one of whom have a great goalie on the road. That’s the biggest factor – you want a team on the road who doesn’t care about entertaining the home fans – just shutting up shop and hoping for the best basically.
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