The Las Vegas Raiders (-2.5) beat the New England Patriots 30-24 on Sunday on the final play of the fourth quarter, in a game bettors — and bookmakers — won’t soon forget.
Down 24-17 late in the fourth quarter, the Raiders drove 81 yards in nine plays for a game-tying 30-yard touchdown to Keelan Cole with 32 seconds left.
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The LAS VEGAS RAIDERS (-2.5) with one of the craziest wins and covers you’ll ever see.
It’s going a loooong week for Jakobi Meyers in the meeting roompic.twitter.com/56tVNno71g
— Ben Fawkes (@BFawkes22) December 19, 2022
The Patriots got the ball back and advanced it to their own 45-yard line. With no timeouts and 10 seconds left, New England RB Rhamondre Stevenson took a draw 23 yards, then lateraled to WR Jakobi Meyers. Meyers ran backwards and then tried to lateral back to QB Mac Jones. The ball was caught by Raiders DE Chandler Jones instead, and he returned it for a 48-yard game-winning TD with no time left.
It was a very bad result for sportsbooks.
VSiN texted four bookmakers about the result for their shops and every one had some adjective approximating "awful." Part of the issue for sportsbooks was that every favorite in the late window (Broncos -2, Chargers -2.5, Bengals -3.5 and Raiders -2.5) covered, and obviously many Las Vegas casinos usually have a higher influx of Raiders money from local fans.
Chris Andrews, South Point sportsbook director, called it, "Terrible, we had a ton of straight bets, but a few pretty big parlays with the Raiders."
Although only 50% of the bets and 56% of the money was on the Raiders -2.5 at DraftKings, sportsbook director Johnny Avello described the Raiders win as a "seven-figure loss."
"It was no good for us." Jason Scott, VP of trading at BetMGM, told VSiN in a text message. "Both singles and parlays hurt."
Chuck Esposito, sportsbook director at Station Casinos, described it as a "Sin City miracle." But he also added: "Bad for us! Biggest [decision] of the afternoon games, however at this point still a pretty good day."
The Raiders moved to 6-8 on the season (7-7 ATS) and kept their dim AFC playoff hopes alive, while the New England Patriots fell to 7-7 (7-6-1 ATS) and faced a lengthy plane ride home.
