Online and retail sportsbooks in the state of Colorado saw a huge month of hockey action with the local team winning it all.
The Colorado Avalanche, the 2022 Stanley Cup Championship winners, drove a massive increase in betting on the sport in June, according to the Colorado Department of Revenue.
According to the state, June wagers on hockey increased by 177% to $29.5 million compared to wagers placed in the same month in 2021 ($10.6 million).
Licensed sportsbooks in the state reported a total of $97 million in Stanley Cup Playoff wagers. The NHL postseason kicked off in early May.
Despite the big increase in hockey action, the total handle for June 2022 of $313.2 million was a decrease of 13% from the prior month, May 2022, of $360.3 million. However, a year-to-year comparison shows a 44.6% increase from the total handle of $229.7 million in June 2021.
In June, baseball placed in the top spot for the month with $106.4 million in total wagers, followed by basketball with just over $44 million in wagers. Hockey wagers placed third with $29.5 million. The fourth spot went to tennis with $23.4 million, and soccer stayed in the fifth slot with $10.3 million.
Completing a fiscal year at the end of June 2022, the total wagers for the last fiscal year, July 2021 to June 2022, came in at $4.81 billion, a 75.7% increase in the total wagers made in the fiscal year 2020-2021 of $2.73 billion.
The state legalized sports betting in 2019 and kicked off online betting in May 2020.
