luckadjusted
NHL Week 1 · 2026-27

2025-26 regular season · December 2, 2025 · SO

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

Blackhawks at Golden Knights, Dec 2, 2025: who deserved to win?

The Golden Knights beat the Blackhawks 4–3, but the replays call it close to a coin flip: with the way both teams played, the Golden Knights win 5 of 10. Luck ran their way: shootout alone was worth 51 points of win probability to the Golden Knights.

The biggest swing (SO): the Golden Knights won the shootout, worth 51 points of win probability to the Golden Knights.

Final (SO)

Chicago Blackhawks 3
Vegas Golden Knights 4

December 2, 2025 · T-Mobile Arena

Luck index +48 Golden Knights lucky · −48 Blackhawks

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. Blackhawks win 5, Golden Knights win 5.

  1. 1 CHI 5 VGK 1
  2. 2 CHI 4 VGK 1
  3. 3 CHI 2 VGK 0
  4. 4 CHI 3 VGK 2
  5. 5 CHI 4 VGK 3
  6. 6 CHI 3 VGK 4
  7. 7 CHI 2 VGK 3
  8. 8 CHI 3 VGK 4
  9. 9 CHI 2 VGK 4
  10. 10 CHI 1 VGK 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 3,999.8 replays ended

Blackhawks win 48% of them, Golden Knights 52%. The line is what actually happened: Golden Knights by 1.

Show as a table
Final margin in the replaysShare of replays
Blackhawks by 3+15.5%
Blackhawks by 210.4%
Blackhawks by 121.8%
Golden Knights by 123.9%
Golden Knights by 211.3%
Golden Knights by 3+17.2%

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 +0.9 goals to the Golden Knights: the final margin was Golden Knights by 1, without the luck Golden Knights by 0.1. Luck shares are the fitted ones (how much of each kind is luck).
ShootingUnblocked attemptsGoalsExpected goalsAbove expected
Blackhawks3932.30+0.70
Golden Knights3932.49+0.51

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 14:14 Slashing on the Golden Knights (Ivan Barbashev): 2 minutes on the power play +4% CHI
P1 6:35 Holding on the Golden Knights (Shea Theodore): 2 minutes on the power play +4% CHI
P2 14:58 Holding on the Blackhawks (Sam Rinzel): 2 minutes on the power play +5% VGK
P2 13:17 Tripping on the Golden Knights (Carter Hart): 2 minutes on the power play +5% CHI
P2 8:38 Delaying game unsuccessful challenge on the Golden Knights (VGK): 2 minutes on the power play +4% CHI
P2 8:16 Hooking on the Blackhawks (Frank Nazar): 2 minutes on the power play +4% VGK
P3 11:15 Slashing on the Golden Knights (Zach Whitecloud): 2 minutes on the power play +5% CHI

When it happened

Golden Knights’ chance of winning

As low as 10% 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 Golden Knights were ahead in it, below while the Blackhawks were.
#WhenWhat happenedWin probability forNext drive
1 P1 19:33 Ivan Barbashev scored on a wrist shot from 34 feetShooting · 4% chance +15% VGK –
2 P1 18:37 Oliver Moore scored on a wrist shot from 39 feetShooting · 4% chance +15% CHI –
3 P2 8:38 Tyler Bertuzzi scored on a wrist shot from 18 feetShooting · 10% chanceDelaying game unsuccessful challenge on the Golden Knights (VGK): 2 minutes on the power playPenalty calls +24% CHI –
4 P2 2:41 Ben Hutton scored on a slap shot from 51 feetShooting · 3% chance +24% VGK –
5 P3 15:15 Connor Bedard scored on a snap shot from 28 feetShooting · 11% chance +25% CHI –
6 P3 2:30 Shea Theodore’s wrist shot from 5 feet was savedShooting · 19% chance +8% CHI –
7 P3 2:28 Braeden Bowman scored on a backhand shot from 8 feetShooting · 11% chance +38% VGK –
8 SO The Golden Knights won the shootoutShootout · shootouts are close to coin flips +51% VGK –

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

Blackhawks 47% · Golden Knights 53%

Final margin
Golden Knights by 1
Luck in goals
0.9 for the Golden Knights
Luck-adjusted margin
Golden Knights by 0.1
Replay with same day's form
Blackhawks 48% · Golden Knights 52% 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.

All week 9 2025-26 games · Blackhawks · Golden Knights

More from week 9, 2025-26

Every game of week 9, 2025-26