Updated Stanley Cup Odds: Best Bets & Longshot Value for 2026 Playoffs

• The NHL Stanley Cup Playoffs start Saturday, April 18
• The Colorado Avalanche are the betting favorite to take the title
• See the odds for all teams heading into the playoffs, and my best bets, including longshot and eventual champion

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It was a long, winding road, and now we’re just one sleep away from the start of the NHL Playoffs.

After back-to-back titles, the Florida Panthers didn’t even make the postseason, so we’ll have a new team hoisting Lord Stanley’s mug.

The books have the Colorado Avalanche as the team to beat in the Stanley Cup odds, followed by the Tampa Bay Lightning and Carolina Hurricanes — who, coincidentally, were the betting favorites prior to the start of the season.

What are the odds for all 16 teams left standing to lift Lord Stanley in June? Below I’ll list the odds and share some of my bets worth considering.

2026 Stanley Cup Odds

Colorado, who won the Stanley Cup in 2022, won the Presidents’ Trophy this year as the top team in the regular season, picking up 121 points, the only team in the league to cross that threshold.

Carolina, who last won the Stanley Cup in 2006, is the +500 favorite over Tampa Bay, who won two straight from 2020-21, hold the second-best odds +370, with the Hurricanes coming in third at +500.

Canadian hockey fans wanting to see the cup return north of the border have three hopes: the back-to-back finalist Edmonton Oilers (+1400) and the upstart Ottawa Senators (+1600), and Montreal Canadiens (+2700).

Odds as of April 18 at FanDuel. New customers can claim a FanDuel promo code to get a bonus to bet on the NHL Playoffs.

2026 Stanley Cup Best Bets

I mentioned the Avalanche as the Presidents’ Trophy winner but that’s been more curse than gift. Even with NHL goal scoring leader Nathan MacKinnon, pulling off the best team in the regular season and adding a championship hasn’t happened in the same year since 2012-13 when the Chicago Blackhawks hav done it.

In fact, Chicago and the Detroit Red Wings, who did it twice (2007-08 and 2001-02) and the Avalanche in 2000-01 are the only teams to pull off the feat this millennium.

Who does that open the door to? This should be an ideal spot for Dallas, the team with the third most points in the league this year, but their +1100 odds are tempered in the absolute bloodbath they have to go through to get through to West Final.

They’d have to knock off the Minnesota Wild — who hold the third best record in the West — and then likely through Colorado.

In the East, Carolina at +500 feels like a solid wager. This is a team that ended the year 11-3-1 in its final 15 games, and led the league in scoring once the NHL resumed after the Olympics.

The other team that should be considered here are the Edmonton Oilers. This was not a great year for them by any measure, but they still have the best player on the planet in Connor McDavid, co-ster Leo Draisaitl (lower body) should be back for Round 1, and Connor Ingram has looked … competent, which is a massive upgrade from what they had.

Thrown in the fact they get a struggling Anaheim Ducks team to start — they finished 2-6-2 to end the season — and that could be the jumpstart they need for another run.

Stanley Cup Longshot Value Picks

Teams in the middle of the board are screaming to get on some tickets.

The Ottawa Senators looked like an entirely different team post-Olympics. They finished their final 25 games at 16-5-4, the second-most points in the league in that stretch, ranking Top 4 in the NHL in both goals for and goals against.

Carolina is a beast to open against, but part of their closing 11-2-2 kick to the regular season was a dominant 6-3 win over these very Hurricanes.

Hard to believe that a division champion is a longshot to win the cup, but I present you the Atlantic Division champion-Buffalo Sabres (+1800). The Sabres who tied the most points with St Louis and Philadelphia at 37 post-Olympics and ranked Top 5 in both goals for and against. They should crush the Bruins, and should be in a dead heat vs the winner of Tampa-Montreal.

Speaking of those Habs (+2700), they finished the year 16-7-2 in their last 25, and boast one of the two 50-goal scorers in the league in Cole Caufield. Tampa won just four of their final nine games to close out the year, and two of those were to the Canadiens, who held them to one goal in both contests.

2026 Stanley Cup Champion Prediction

With all due respect to the Atlantic trio of Buffalo, Tampa and Montreal, the Central Division was the cream of the NHL crop for the season, and I do believe the team that comes of that gauntlet will move their way to the Stanley Cup title.

I’m keeping with the Presidents’ Trophy curse, so it will be a rough ending for the Colorado Avalanche, but this could be the breakthrough year for the Dallas Stars.

They’ve been to the West Final each of the last three years, only to come up short. That hasn’t stopped them from having another great regular season — hitting 50 wins for the third straight year — and they might just be ready to bridge the gap to a championship.

They finished the year second to Colorado in goals against, and while they finished ninth in scoring, the Stars boast the second-best PP unit in the league.

• Pick: Stars (+1100 at FanDuel)