On Tuesday night, the Ottawa Senators face bitter rivals the Toronto Maple Leafs at Scotiabank Arena. BET99 has the Leafs as -130 home favorites over the +110 Sens and while the public is backing the Leafs to win with 70% of bets, sharps aren't so convinced with the Sens holding 55% of the handle.
Where the public and sharps agree is on the total. Let's dive into the betting handles for the first edition of the Battle of Ontario for the 2024-25 NHL season.
Senators vs Maple Leafs Betting Handles
Betting handles per BET99
In my expert pick for this game I said the total will go OVER six goals thanks to some strong offense on both sides of the ice, the public and sharps agree with OVER 6 goals getting 83% of bets and 62% of the handle.
On the moneyline, the public is massively favoring the Leafs with 70% of the bets. But without trying to inflate your local Leafs fan's ego too much, Toronto does have the biggest fanbase in the league and fans tend to bet their bias so take the 70% of bets on the Leafs with a grain of salt.
Interestingly enough, the percentage of bets on the Leafs to win doesn't match when it comes to the puckline with 67% of the bets on the Sens to cover, even sharps are skewed more toward Ottawa with 62% of the handle.
Why Are The Public and Sharps Betting OVER 6 Goals?
Even though the Leafs are 5-0-1 against the UNDER in their last six games Johnny Public and the sharpest sharp noticed that most of Toronto's opponents in that six-game sample are at the bottom of the league for goals per game, unlike Ottawa's 11th-ranked goals per game (3.43) so there's plenty of offense on both sides of the ice tonight.
No one is scared of Linus Ullmark getting the start in the Ottawa net with the former Vezina winner being as leaky as a sieve with a 0.890 save percentage and 2.87 goals against average this year. Ullmark also has terrible splits against the Leafs with a career 4-5-1 record, a 0.896 save percentage, and a 3.23 goals-against average.
Bettors probably also looked at the past trend between these two clubs and noticed that the total has gone OVER in five of their last seven games (71%). So with that trend in mind, how well both teams can score, and Ottawa's poor goaltending we'll see enough twine-ticklers to push the total above six goals tonight.