luckadjusted
NHL Week 1 · 2026-27

2025-26 regular season · October 16, 2025

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

Penguins at Kings, Oct 16, 2025: who deserved to win?

The Penguins beat the Kings 4–2, but the replays call it close to a coin flip: with the way both teams played, the Penguins win 5 of 10. Luck ran their way: shooting alone was worth 25 points of win probability to the Penguins.

The biggest swing (P3, 13:10 left): Filip Hallander scored on a snap shot from 4 feet, worth 25 points of win probability to the Penguins.

Final

Pittsburgh Penguins 4
Los Angeles Kings 2

October 16, 2025 · Crypto.com Arena

Luck index +47 Penguins lucky · −47 Kings

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. Penguins win 5, Kings win 5.

  1. 1 PIT 6 LAK 2
  2. 2 PIT 4 LAK 1
  3. 3 PIT 3 LAK 1
  4. 4 PIT 2 LAK 1
  5. 5 PIT 6 LAK 5
  6. 6 PIT 2 LAK 3
  7. 7 PIT 0 LAK 1
  8. 8 PIT 0 LAK 2
  9. 9 PIT 0 LAK 3
  10. 10 PIT 0 LAK 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

Penguins win 53% of them, Kings 47%. The line is what actually happened: Penguins by 2.

Show as a table
Final margin in the replaysShare of replays
Penguins by 3+22.2%
Penguins by 210.5%
Penguins by 120.6%
Kings by 120.8%
Kings by 29.1%
Kings by 3+16.8%

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 +1.2 goals to the Penguins: the final margin was Penguins by 2, without the luck Penguins by 0.8. Luck shares are the fitted ones (how much of each kind is luck).
ShootingUnblocked attemptsGoalsExpected goalsAbove expected
Penguins3732.97+0.03
Kings4422.83−0.83

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
P2 14:12 Hooking on the Kings (Quinton Byfield): 2 minutes on the power play +3% PIT
P2 3:49 Tripping on the Penguins (Sidney Crosby): 2 minutes on the power play +5% LAK
P3 15:02 Hooking on the Penguins (Sidney Crosby): 2 minutes on the power play +7% LAK
P3 5:41 High sticking on the Kings (Adrian Kempe): 2 minutes on the power play +6% PIT

When it happened

Kings’ chance of winning

As low as 0% and as high as 87%. 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 Kings were ahead in it, below while the Penguins were.
#WhenWhat happenedWin probability forNext drive
1 P1 15:36 Warren Foegele scored on a wrist shot from 13 feetShooting · 10% chance +14% LAK –
2 P1 10:56 Kevin Fiala scored on a tip from 4 feetShooting · 16% chance +11% LAK –
3 P2 13:23 Evgeni Malkin scored on a snap shot from 27 feetShooting · 7% chance +13% PIT –
4 P2 12:42 Connor Dewar scored on a wrist shot from 13 feetShooting · 7% chance +19% PIT –
5 P3 15:05 Quinton Byfield’s snap shot from 8 feet was savedShooting · 22% chance +6% PIT –
6 P3 15:02 Hooking on the Penguins (Sidney Crosby): 2 minutes on the power playPenalty calls +7% LAK –
7 P3 13:10 Filip Hallander scored on a snap shot from 4 feetShooting · 18% chance +25% PIT –
8 P3 5:41 High sticking on the Kings (Adrian Kempe): 2 minutes on the power playPenalty calls +6% 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

Penguins 65% · Kings 35%

Final margin
Penguins by 2
Luck in goals
1.2 for the Penguins
Luck-adjusted margin
Penguins by 0.8
Replay with same day's form
Penguins 53% · Kings 47% 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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