luckadjusted
NHL Week 1 · 2026-27

2025-26 regular season · December 16, 2025

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

Flyers at Canadiens, Dec 16, 2025: who deserved to win?

The Flyers beat the Canadiens 4–1, but the replays call it close to a coin flip: with the way both teams played, the Flyers win 4 of 10. Luck ran their way: shooting alone was worth 21 points of win probability to the Flyers.

The biggest swing (P2, 13:34 left): Trevor Zegras scored on a snap shot from 17 feet, worth 17 points of win probability to the Flyers.

Final

Philadelphia Flyers 4
Montreal Canadiens 1

December 16, 2025 · Centre Bell

Luck index +59 Flyers lucky · −59 Canadiens

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. Flyers win 4, Canadiens win 6.

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

Flyers win 41% of them, Canadiens 59%. The line is what actually happened: Flyers by 3.

Show as a table
Final margin in the replaysShare of replays
Flyers by 3+11.4%
Flyers by 28.6%
Flyers by 121.3%
Canadiens by 122.3%
Canadiens by 211.7%
Canadiens by 3+24.6%

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 +2.5 goals to the Flyers: the final margin was Flyers by 3, without the luck Flyers by 0.5. Luck shares are the fitted ones (how much of each kind is luck).
ShootingUnblocked attemptsGoalsExpected goalsAbove expected
Flyers2832.05+0.95
Canadiens4412.86−1.86

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 10:56 Cross checking on the Canadiens (Ivan Demidov): 2 minutes on the power play +4% PHI
P1 6:29 Tripping on the Canadiens (Alexandre Carrier): 2 minutes on the power play +4% PHI
P2 16:28 Holding the stick on the Flyers (Sean Couturier): 2 minutes on the power play +5% MTL
P3 6:09 High sticking on the Canadiens (Brendan Gallagher): 2 minutes on the power play +2% PHI

When it happened

Canadiens’ chance of winning

As low as 0% and as high as 71%. 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 Canadiens were ahead in it, below while the Flyers were.
#WhenWhat happenedWin probability forNext drive
1 P1 9:45 Sean Couturier’s snap shot from 7 feet was savedShooting · 27% chance +5% MTL –
2 P1 6:29 Tripping on the Canadiens (Alexandre Carrier): 2 minutes on the power playPenalty calls +4% PHI –
3 P1 1:00 Alexandre Texier scored on a snap shot from 26 feetShooting · 14% chance +16% MTL –
4 P1 0:21 Carl Grundstrom scored on a snap shot from 19 feetShooting · 10% chance +16% PHI –
5 P2 16:28 Holding the stick on the Flyers (Sean Couturier): 2 minutes on the power playPenalty calls +5% MTL –
6 P2 13:34 Trevor Zegras scored on a snap shot from 17 feetShooting · 18% chance +17% PHI –
7 P2 0:50 Bobby Brink scored on a snap shot from 18 feetShooting · 19% chance +13% PHI –
8 P3 19:23 Zachary Bolduc’s snap shot from 5 feet was savedShooting · 29% chance +5% PHI –

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

Flyers 64% · Canadiens 36%

Final margin
Flyers by 3
Luck in goals
2.5 for the Flyers
Luck-adjusted margin
Flyers by 0.5
Replay with same day's form
Flyers 41% · Canadiens 59% 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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