luckadjusted
NHL Week 1 · 2026-27

2025-26 regular season · October 9, 2025

No betting line for this game, so there is no before-puck-drop or fresh-game number.

Islanders at Penguins, Oct 9, 2025: who deserved to win?

The Penguins beat the Islanders 4–3, but the replays call it close to a coin flip: with the way both teams played, the Penguins win 6 of 10. Luck ran their way: shooting alone was worth 19 points of win probability to the Penguins.

The biggest swing (P3, 5:39 left): Justin Brazeau scored on a backhand shot from 8 feet, worth 33 points of win probability to the Penguins.

Final

New York Islanders 3
Pittsburgh Penguins 4

October 9, 2025 · PPG Paints Arena

Luck index +45 Penguins lucky · −45 Islanders

Each team’s own shots from this game, resampled into new games 4,000 times, each a goal at its chance, with the power plays the penalties gave and the pulled goalie at the end: with the way both teams actually played, how often does this performance win? How the replay works

Ten replays. Islanders win 4, Penguins win 6.

  1. 1 NYI 4 PIT 1
  2. 2 NYI 3 PIT 1
  3. 3 NYI 5 PIT 4
  4. 4 NYI 4 PIT 3
  5. 5 NYI 2 PIT 3
  6. 6 NYI 3 PIT 4
  7. 7 NYI 1 PIT 3
  8. 8 NYI 4 PIT 7
  9. 9 NYI 1 PIT 4
  10. 10 NYI 3 PIT 7

Three other ways to ask

Each answers a different question, so none of them replaces the replay above.

No closing line for this game.

Needs the closing line, which this game has not got.

Every shot redrawn at its chance, overtime and the shootout replayed as near coin flips; the shots themselves and every call fixed. The narrowest view of luck.

How 4,000 replays ended

Islanders win 45% of them, Penguins 55%. The line is what actually happened: Penguins by 1.

Show as a table
Final margin in the replaysShare of replays
Islanders by 3+15.1%
Islanders by 29.4%
Islanders by 120.2%
Penguins by 120.2%
Penguins by 210.6%
Penguins by 3+24.5%

Where the luck was

What the luck was worth

Every lucky and unlucky play, weighted by the moment it happened: its swing in win probability, added up by kind. A post hit in a blowout counts for nothing; the same post with a minute left in a tie game can be most of a win.

Swings add up across a game, so in one that went back and forth they can pass 100%. On the scoreboard the same luck was worth +0.6 goals to the Penguins: the final margin was Penguins by 1, without the luck Penguins by 0.4. Luck shares are the fitted ones (how much of each kind is luck).
ShootingUnblocked attemptsGoalsExpected goalsAbove expected
Islanders4933.07−0.07
Penguins4143.21+0.79

Regulation with both goalies in. Expected goals: our model of each shot’s chance from where and how it was taken (distance, angle, shot type, rebound, rush, strength), adjusted for the shooter’s and the goalie’s records. A team above expected finished better or met a weaker night in goal; 75% of the gap counts as luck (why that share).

Calls

Every penalty that put a team on the power play, and every goal taken off the board on review, with what it did to the helped team’s chance of winning at that moment. Calls don’t count toward luck by default: who draws penalties repeats from game to game like a skill (how calls are valued). Switch them on below.

WhenCallWin probability for
P1 17:00 High sticking on the Islanders (Alexander Romanov): 2 minutes on the power play +4% PIT
P1 12:19 Delaying game puck over glass on the Penguins (Noel Acciari): 2 minutes on the power play +3% NYI
P2 11:17 Hooking on the Islanders (Bo Horvat): 2 minutes on the power play +5% PIT
P2 8:20 Tripping on the Penguins (Erik Karlsson): 2 minutes on the power play +4% NYI
P2 6:22 Tripping on the Islanders (Mathew Barzal): 2 minutes on the power play +4% PIT
P3 17:45 Hooking on the Islanders (Simon Holmstrom): 2 minutes on the power play +6% PIT
P3 3:45 Hooking on the Penguins (Ben Kindel): 2 minutes on the power play +6% NYI
P3 0:15 Cross checking on the Islanders (Jonathan Drouin): 5 minutes on the power play +14% PIT

When it happened

Penguins’ chance of winning

As low as 33% and as high as 100%. Numbers mark the biggest luck moments, listed below.

Our in-game win probability: the score and the time left, starting from the betting line (or the home edge alone when there is none), with goals at the league’s rates for the score. Overtime is drawn at a fixed width. Shaded above the middle while the Penguins were ahead in it, below while the Islanders were.
#WhenWhat happenedWin probability forNext drive
1 P1 16:37 Rickard Rakell scored on a backhand shot from 10 feetShooting · 14% chance +14% PIT –
2 P1 7:58 Jonathan Drouin scored on a snap shot from 38 feetShooting · 8% chance +16% NYI –
3 P2 15:56 Kyle Palmieri scored on a wrist shot from 28 feetShooting · 6% chance +19% NYI –
4 P2 14:19 Harrison Brunicke scored on a snap shot from 34 feetShooting · 9% chance +19% PIT –
5 P2 11:02 Sidney Crosby scored on a tip from 5 feetShooting · 21% chance +16% PIT –
6 P2 0:41 Max Shabanov scored on a snap shot from 32 feetShooting · 7% chance +23% NYI –
7 P3 5:39 Justin Brazeau scored on a backhand shot from 8 feetShooting · 12% chance +33% PIT –
8 P3 0:15 Cross checking on the Islanders (Jonathan Drouin): 5 minutes on the power playPenalty calls +14% PIT –

Adjust the assumptions

Think finishing is more skill than we do, or that the calls were luck? Change it and the coin-flip replay reruns in your browser.

Only coin-flips re-rolled

Islanders 48% · Penguins 52%

Final margin
Penguins by 1
Luck in goals
0.6 for the Penguins
Luck-adjusted margin
Penguins by 0.4
Replay with same day's form
Islanders 45% · Penguins 55% unchanged: why
How much of each is luck?

0% treats it as skill, 100% as pure luck. The tick is our fit.

What counts
Flip a play

Force the other outcome, in this game and in every replay: a goal becomes a save, a post goes in, a penalty goes the other way.

About these numbers

Play-by-play from the NHL via fastRhockey; expected goals, in-game win probability and the replays are our own models, fitted on every game since 2018-19 (methodology and validation). Blocked shots aren’t replayed (their location is the block’s, not the shot’s). No betting line for this game, so there is no before-puck-drop or fresh-game number.

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