With Game 6 of the Stanley Cup Finals just a few hours away, sports enthusiasts are quick to split their bets between the two finalists, the Edmonton Oilers and the Florida Panthers. And with the Panthers already leading the Oilers 3-2, they are the heavy favorites to lift the trophy.
But that doesn’t mean that the Oilers don’t have their share of supporters who are still hoping for a miracle. Head coach Kris Knoblauch and his men are motivated to take revenge for last year’s loss. Among the many men who bet on the Oilers last year was Canadian rapper Drake.
Drake has been associated with high-stakes sports betting for a long time now. He often is not scared when he makes bets, and that showed last year as he went all in for the 2024 Stanley Cup Finals.
Drake Once Bet $500K on an Oilers Miracle
Last year, Drake revealed on Instagram that he placed bets on both the NBA and NHL Finals. With $500,000 staked on both the Mavericks and Oilers, Drake hoped for a big payout. This amount is nearly half of Oilers’ goalie Calvin Pickard’s salary.
Unfortunately for Drake, the big payout never happened. Yet, Drake’s hopes for the Oilers turning out to be the champions cannot be undermined, as the Edmonton team nearly overcame the early 3-0 lead of the Panthers to level the finals. But last-minute heroics by Sam Reinhart and Sergei Bobrovsky, saving 23 out of the 24 shots on target, turned the game around.
View this post on Instagram
Drake, in his post, mentioned, “Oilers are self-explanatory.”
With odds of 2.05, if the Oilers had managed to take Game 7, Drake would have gotten a neat million in his game winnings. Meanwhile, had the Mavericks won against the Celtics as well, his total earnings would have reached upwards of $2.4 million.
But come the NBA Finals, the Mavericks also crashed out in Game 5 to give Boston its 18th championship. Drake has not mentioned any further bets on big matchups this season regarding the Oilers or, for that matter, any NHL team.
His last post regarding a sports bet was on June 2, when he bet $750K on the Indian Premier League team Royal Challengers Bangalore winning the 2025 IPL Finals. As RCB later went on to lift the IPL trophy, Drake’s estimated earnings were upwards of $1.3 million.
Drake loses $500K bet on Edmonton Oilers as Florida Panthers win Stanley Cup 😳
Drizzy could’ve gotten over $1 million if the Oilers won. pic.twitter.com/CtWAy8u2WL
— Complex Music (@ComplexMusic) June 26, 2024
This proves that the ‘Drake Curse,’ a sports curse named after teams that Drake bets on frequently losing, is false. The curse dates back a few years, when fans first started noticing the trend in 2019, when multiple soccer teams that the rap artist bet on crashed out in deciding games.
But with the Panthers just one win away from claiming their second trophy, Drake is likely to put another bet on the Oilers, seeing that they are the last Canadian team remaining in the mix.
Game 6 of the Stanley Cup Finals will be live from the Panthers’ home stadium of Amerant Arena on June 17.
