luckadjusted
NHL Week 1 · 2026-27

2025-26 regular season · November 26, 2025 · SO

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

Senators at Golden Knights, Nov 26, 2025: who deserved to win?

The Senators beat the Golden Knights 4–3, but the replays lean toward the Golden Knights: they take 7 of 10 with the same day's form. Luck ran their way: shootout alone was worth 50 points of win probability to the Senators.

The game turned on a luck play (SO): the Senators won the shootout, worth 50 points of win probability to the Senators.

Final (SO)

Ottawa Senators 4
Vegas Golden Knights 3

November 26, 2025 · T-Mobile Arena

Luck index +71 Senators very lucky · −71 Golden Knights

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 3, Golden Knights win 7.

  1. 1 OTT 4 VGK 1
  2. 2 OTT 4 VGK 3
  3. 3 OTT 2 VGK 1
  4. 4 OTT 0 VGK 1
  5. 5 OTT 3 VGK 4
  6. 6 OTT 2 VGK 4
  7. 7 OTT 1 VGK 4
  8. 8 OTT 0 VGK 3
  9. 9 OTT 0 VGK 4
  10. 10 OTT 2 VGK 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 3,999.9 replays ended

Senators win 29% of them, Golden Knights 71%. The line is what actually happened: Senators by 1.

Show as a table
Final margin in the replaysShare of replays
Senators by 3+6.0%
Senators by 24.9%
Senators by 117.7%
Golden Knights by 119.8%
Golden Knights by 213.2%
Golden Knights by 3+38.4%

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 +2.4 goals to the Senators: the final margin was Senators by 1, without the luck Golden Knights by 1.4. Luck shares are the fitted ones (how much of each kind is luck).
ShootingUnblocked attemptsGoalsExpected goalsAbove expected
Senators3731.63+1.37
Golden Knights4833.45−0.45

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 18:02 Tripping on the Senators (Claude Giroux): 2 minutes on the power play +4% VGK
P1 7:49 Delaying game puck over glass on the Golden Knights (Zach Whitecloud): 2 minutes on the power play +4% OTT
P1 0:13 High sticking on the Golden Knights (Brandon Saad): 2 minutes on the power play +3% OTT
P2 9:31 Delaying game puck over glass on the Senators (Hayden Hodgson): 2 minutes on the power play +4% VGK
P2 2:34 High sticking on the Golden Knights (Mitch Marner): 2 minutes on the power play +5% OTT
P3 14:48 High sticking on the Senators (Dylan Cozens): 2 minutes on the power play +5% VGK

When it happened

Golden Knights’ chance of winning

As low as 0% and as high as 54%. 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 Golden Knights were ahead in it, below while the Senators were.
#WhenWhat happenedWin probability forNext drive
1 P1 19:09 Shane Pinto scored on a wrist shot from 22 feetShooting · 2% chance +16% OTT –
2 P1 6:56 Jake Sanderson scored on a slap shot from 52 feetShooting · 4% chance +14% OTT –
3 P1 3:08 Brett Howden scored on a backhand shot from 7 feetShooting · 14% chance +13% VGK –
4 P1 0:17 Drake Batherson scored on a snap shot from 16 feetShooting · 21% chance +12% OTT –
5 P2 17:51 Jack Eichel scored on a backhand shot from 3 feetShooting · 19% chance +13% VGK –
6 P3 13:20 Mark Stone scored on a wrist shot from 9 feetShooting · 15% chance +25% VGK –
7 P3 3:35 Jack Eichel’s wrist shot from 12 feet was savedShooting · 14% chance +6% OTT –
8 SO The game turned hereThe Senators won the shootoutShootout · shootouts are close to coin flips +49% OTT –

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 20% · Golden Knights 80%

Final margin
Senators by 1
Luck in goals
2.4 for the Senators
Luck-adjusted margin
Golden Knights by 1.4
Replay with same day's form
Senators 29% · Golden Knights 71% 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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