luckadjusted
NHL Week 1 · 2026-27

2025-26 regular season · October 18, 2025

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

Bruins at Avalanche, Oct 18, 2025: who deserved to win?

The Avalanche beat the Bruins 4–1, and the replays lean their way: with the same day's form, they win 8 of 10.

The biggest swing (P1, 9:38 left): Josh Manson scored on a slap shot from 56 feet, worth 16 points of win probability to the Avalanche.

Final

Boston Bruins 1
Colorado Avalanche 4

October 18, 2025 · Ball Arena

Luck index +21 Avalanche about even · −21 Bruins

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. Bruins win 2, Avalanche win 8.

  1. 1 BOS 2 COL 0
  2. 2 BOS 2 COL 1
  3. 3 BOS 3 COL 4
  4. 4 BOS 1 COL 2
  5. 5 BOS 1 COL 3
  6. 6 BOS 0 COL 3
  7. 7 BOS 1 COL 4
  8. 8 BOS 0 COL 3
  9. 9 BOS 0 COL 4
  10. 10 BOS 2 COL 8

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

Bruins win 21% of them, Avalanche 79%. The line is what actually happened: Avalanche by 3.

Show as a table
Final margin in the replaysShare of replays
Bruins by 3+3.2%
Bruins by 23.7%
Bruins by 114.5%
Avalanche by 117.2%
Avalanche by 213.8%
Avalanche by 3+47.5%

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 +0.2 goals to the Avalanche: the final margin was Avalanche by 3, without the luck Avalanche by 2.8. Luck shares are the fitted ones (how much of each kind is luck).
ShootingUnblocked attemptsGoalsExpected goalsAbove expected
Bruins2111.06−0.06
Avalanche5833.23−0.23

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 6:08 Tripping on the Avalanche (Nathan MacKinnon): 2 minutes on the power play +4% BOS
P1 2:02 Holding on the Bruins (Fraser Minten): 2 minutes on the power play +4% COL
P2 13:20 Cross checking on the Bruins (Hampus Lindholm): 2 minutes on the power play +4% COL
P2 8:25 Tripping on the Bruins (Charlie McAvoy): 2 minutes on the power play +4% COL
P2 2:07 High sticking on the Bruins (Fraser Minten): 2 minutes on the power play +5% COL
P3 12:55 Interference on the Avalanche (Josh Manson): 2 minutes on the power play +2% BOS
P3 7:30 Interference goalkeeper on the Bruins (Nikita Zadorov): 2 minutes on the power play +2% COL

When it happened

Avalanche’ chance of winning

As low as 37% 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 Avalanche were ahead in it, below while the Bruins were.
#WhenWhat happenedWin probability forNext drive
1 P1 16:49 John Beecher scored on a tip from 15 feetShooting · 6% chance +15% BOS –
2 P1 12:52 Nathan MacKinnon scored on a backhand shot from 8 feetShooting · 11% chance +15% COL –
3 P1 9:38 Josh Manson scored on a slap shot from 56 feetShooting · 2% chance +16% COL –
4 P1 2:02 Holding on the Bruins (Fraser Minten): 2 minutes on the power playPenalty calls +4% COL –
5 P2 13:20 Cross checking on the Bruins (Hampus Lindholm): 2 minutes on the power playPenalty calls +4% COL –
6 P2 8:25 Tripping on the Bruins (Charlie McAvoy): 2 minutes on the power playPenalty calls +4% COL –
7 P2 2:07 High sticking on the Bruins (Fraser Minten): 2 minutes on the power playPenalty calls +5% COL –
8 P3 15:46 Nathan MacKinnon scored on a slap shot from 26 feetShooting · 9% chance +13% COL –

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

Bruins 3% · Avalanche 97%

Final margin
Avalanche by 3
Luck in goals
0.2 for the Avalanche
Luck-adjusted margin
Avalanche by 2.8
Replay with same day's form
Bruins 21% · Avalanche 79% 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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