luckadjusted
NHL Week 1 · 2026-27

2025-26 regular season · December 18, 2025

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

Blackhawks at Canadiens, Dec 18, 2025: who deserved to win?

The Canadiens beat the Blackhawks 4–1, and the replays lean their way: with the same day's form, they win 7 of 10. The Blackhawks had the bounces: shooting alone was worth 9 points of win probability to the Blackhawks.

The biggest swing (P3, 19:40 left): Zachary Bolduc scored on a tip from 14 feet, worth 23 points of win probability to the Canadiens.

Final

Chicago Blackhawks 1
Montreal Canadiens 4

December 18, 2025 · Centre Bell

Luck index +29 Canadiens lucky · −29 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 3, Canadiens win 7.

  1. 1 CHI 4 MTL 1
  2. 2 CHI 2 MTL 1
  3. 3 CHI 4 MTL 3
  4. 4 CHI 3 MTL 4
  5. 5 CHI 1 MTL 2
  6. 6 CHI 2 MTL 4
  7. 7 CHI 1 MTL 4
  8. 8 CHI 0 MTL 3
  9. 9 CHI 1 MTL 5
  10. 10 CHI 1 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 4,000 replays ended

Blackhawks win 28% of them, Canadiens 72%. The line is what actually happened: Canadiens by 3.

Show as a table
Final margin in the replaysShare of replays
Blackhawks by 3+5.9%
Blackhawks by 25.8%
Blackhawks by 116.9%
Canadiens by 118.7%
Canadiens by 212.0%
Canadiens by 3+40.8%

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 +0.1 goals to the Blackhawks: the final margin was Canadiens by 3, without the luck Canadiens by 3.1. Luck shares are the fitted ones (how much of each kind is luck).
ShootingUnblocked attemptsGoalsExpected goalsAbove expected
Blackhawks3312.06−1.06
Canadiens5233.72−0.72

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 15:11 Tripping on the Canadiens (Noah Dobson): 2 minutes on the power play +5% CHI
P2 4:48 Hooking on the Blackhawks (Dominic Toninato): 2 minutes on the power play +5% MTL
P2 1:48 Tripping on the Blackhawks (Frank Nazar): 2 minutes on the power play +6% MTL
P3 9:39 Slashing on the Canadiens (Arber Xhekaj): 2 minutes on the power play +2% CHI

When it happened

Canadiens’ chance of winning

As low as 36% 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 Canadiens were ahead in it, below while the Blackhawks were.
#WhenWhat happenedWin probability forNext drive
1 P1 12:33 Frank Nazar scored on a tip from 7 feetShooting · 8% chance +15% CHI –
2 P1 5:37 Zachary Bolduc scored on a snap shot from 27 feetShooting · 13% chance +16% MTL –
3 P2 17:24 Joe Veleno’s snap shot from 5 feet was savedShooting · 32% chance +6% CHI –
4 P2 4:24 Nick Suzuki’s snap shot from 9 feet was savedShooting · 27% chance +6% CHI –
5 P2 4:03 Juraj Slafkovský missed the net with a snap shot from 10 feetShooting · 24% chance +6% CHI –
6 P2 1:48 Tripping on the Blackhawks (Frank Nazar): 2 minutes on the power playPenalty calls +6% MTL –
7 P3 19:40 Zachary Bolduc scored on a tip from 14 feetShooting · 8% chance +23% MTL –
8 P3 10:00 Noah Dobson scored on a backhand shot from 12 feetShooting · 2% chance +13% MTL –

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 5% · Canadiens 95%

Final margin
Canadiens by 3
Luck in goals
0.1 for the Blackhawks
Luck-adjusted margin
Canadiens by 3.1
Replay with same day's form
Blackhawks 28% · Canadiens 72% 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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