luckadjusted
NHL Week 1 · 2026-27

2025-26 regular season · October 15, 2025

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

Senators at Sabres, Oct 15, 2025: who deserved to win?

The Sabres beat the Senators 8–4, but the replays lean toward the Senators: they take 6 of 10 with the same day's form. Luck ran their way: shooting alone was worth 51 points of win probability to the Sabres.

The biggest swing (P2, 16:02 left): Jake Sanderson scored on a poke shot from 5 feet, worth 20 points of win probability to the Senators.

Final

Ottawa Senators 4
Buffalo Sabres 8

October 15, 2025 · KeyBank Center

Luck index +61 Sabres very lucky · −61 Senators

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. Senators win 6, Sabres win 4.

  1. 1 OTT 6 BUF 1
  2. 2 OTT 3 BUF 0
  3. 3 OTT 5 BUF 2
  4. 4 OTT 4 BUF 2
  5. 5 OTT 3 BUF 2
  6. 6 OTT 1 BUF 0
  7. 7 OTT 0 BUF 1
  8. 8 OTT 5 BUF 6
  9. 9 OTT 2 BUF 4
  10. 10 OTT 1 BUF 4

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

Senators win 61% of them, Sabres 39%. The line is what actually happened: Sabres by 4.

Show as a table
Final margin in the replaysShare of replays
Senators by 3+30.1%
Senators by 211.4%
Senators by 119.0%
Sabres by 119.6%
Sabres by 27.9%
Sabres by 3+12.0%

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 +3.3 goals to the Sabres: the final margin was Sabres by 4, without the luck Sabres by 0.8. Luck shares are the fitted ones (how much of each kind is luck).
ShootingUnblocked attemptsGoalsExpected goalsAbove expected
Senators5243.50+0.50
Sabres3172.37+4.63

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 13:24 Holding on the Senators (Fabian Zetterlund): 2 minutes on the power play +4% BUF
P1 9:51 Interference on the Sabres (Ryan Johnson): 2 minutes on the power play +3% OTT
P1 6:39 Delaying game on the Sabres (Jacob Bryson): 2 minutes on the power play +4% OTT
P2 17:43 Tripping on the Sabres (Bowen Byram): 2 minutes on the power play +4% OTT
P2 16:02 Delaying game unsuccessful challenge on the Sabres (BUF): 2 minutes on the power play +4% OTT
P2 14:12 Slashing on the Sabres (Alex Tuch): 2 minutes on the power play +4% OTT
P2 8:57 Roughing on the Senators (Shane Pinto): 2 minutes on the power play +4% BUF
P2 6:48 High sticking on the Senators (Ridly Greig): 2 minutes on the power play +3% BUF

When it happened

Sabres’ chance of winning

As low as 32% 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 Sabres were ahead in it, below while the Senators were.
#WhenWhat happenedWin probability forNext drive
1 P1 11:59 Jack Quinn scored on a slap shot from 25 feetShooting · 21% chance +13% BUF –
2 P1 3:51 Tim Stützle scored on a tip from 6 feetShooting · 10% chance +16% OTT –
3 P2 16:02 Jake Sanderson scored on a poke shot from 5 feetShooting · 20% chanceDelaying game unsuccessful challenge on the Sabres (BUF): 2 minutes on the power playPenalty calls +20% OTT –
4 P2 13:14 Ryan McLeod scored on a wrist shot from 19 feetShooting · 7% chance +19% BUF –
5 P2 9:43 Alex Tuch scored on a wrist shot from 8 feetShooting · 16% chance +18% BUF –
6 P2 8:14 Jason Zucker scored on a wrist shot from 27 feetShooting · 10% chance +13% BUF –
7 P3 17:45 Lars Eller scored on a slap shot from 16 feetShooting · 20% chance +12% OTT –
8 P3 17:28 Ryan McLeod scored on a wrist shot from 27 feetShooting · 9% chance +13% BUF –

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

Senators 37% · Sabres 63%

Final margin
Sabres by 4
Luck in goals
3.3 for the Sabres
Luck-adjusted margin
Sabres by 0.7
Replay with same day's form
Senators 61% · Sabres 39% 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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