Gov. Roy Cooper celebrates start of mobile sports betting in NC by picking Canes to win it all

Cooper placed a bet on the Hurricanes winning the Stanley Cup in a PSA sent out on X, formerly Twitter.

"Sports betting is now legal in North Carolina and I'm taking the Canes to win the Stanley Cup," Cooper said in the spot, which advises North Carolinians to bet responsibly.

The Hurricanes haven't won the cup since 2006, but should they win this year, Cooper and others stand to win big.

Monday marked almost nine months since Cooper signed a bill to legalize mobile sports gambling in North Carolina, a long-awaited measure for gamblers and sports fans. Cooper is a noted Hurricanes fan and regularly attends games at PNC Arena, even sounding the siren.

"We know it's a big thing," Cooper told WRAL about sports gambling. "It's a lot of money. It can create a ton of jobs. You can corral what's happening anyway and put some guardrails on it and use the benefit for the state taxpayers to draw in revenue."

North Carolina is the 30th state to legalize mobile sports betting. Lots of bets will be made in the coming weeks during the NCAA men's basketball tournament. Major League Baseball starts later in March and the NBA and NHL playoffs start in April.

The Hurricanes (39-19-6) have a big week with home games against the New York Rangers and Florida Panthers, teams that eliminated them from the postseason in 2022 and 2023. The Hurricanes are anywhere from +800 to +1200 to win the Stanley Cup this season, which is among the most favorable odds in the NHL.

Cooper has been Governor since 2016 and is in the last year of his tenure with the election looming in November.

"What I would really love is if we could, in my last year as governor, we could win the Stanley Cup because I'd be lobbying Tom Dundon and Don Waddell and Gary Betman for the cup in the governor's mansion for a day," He said. "Pour a little Diet Sun Drop in it. We'd have a great, great time."