luckadjusted
NHL Week 1 · 2026-27

2025-26 regular season · December 27, 2025 · OT

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

Capitals at Devils, Dec 27, 2025: who deserved to win?

The Capitals beat the Devils 4–3, and the replays lean their way: with the same day's form, they win 7 of 10. The Devils had the bounces: shooting alone was worth 20 points of win probability to the Devils.

The game turned on a luck play (OT): the Capitals won in overtime, worth 51 points of win probability to the Capitals.

Final (OT)

Washington Capitals 4
New Jersey Devils 3

December 27, 2025 · Prudential Center

Luck index +35 Capitals lucky · −35 Devils

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. Capitals win 7, Devils win 3.

  1. 1 WSH 5 NJD 0
  2. 2 WSH 6 NJD 2
  3. 3 WSH 4 NJD 1
  4. 4 WSH 3 NJD 0
  5. 5 WSH 5 NJD 3
  6. 6 WSH 5 NJD 4
  7. 7 WSH 5 NJD 4
  8. 8 WSH 2 NJD 3
  9. 9 WSH 0 NJD 1
  10. 10 WSH 3 NJD 6

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

Capitals win 65% of them, Devils 35%. The line is what actually happened: Capitals by 1.

Show as a table
Final margin in the replaysShare of replays
Capitals by 3+35.4%
Capitals by 211.1%
Capitals by 118.6%
Devils by 119.0%
Devils by 26.9%
Devils by 3+9.0%

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 Capitals: the final margin was Capitals by 1, without the luck Capitals by 0.9. Luck shares are the fitted ones (how much of each kind is luck).
ShootingUnblocked attemptsGoalsExpected goalsAbove expected
Capitals4433.76−0.76
Devils4832.56+0.44

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 8:06 A Capitals goal came off the board on review (off side) +17% NJD
P2 15:14 Hooking on the Capitals (Brandon Duhaime): 2 minutes on the power play +4% NJD
P2 12:45 Hooking on the Capitals (Brandon Duhaime): 2 minutes on the power play +5% NJD
P2 6:03 Interference on the Devils (Cody Glass): 2 minutes on the power play +5% WSH

When it happened

Devils’ chance of winning

As low as 0% and as high as 81%. 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 Devils were ahead in it, below while the Capitals were.
#WhenWhat happenedWin probability forNext drive
1 P1 8:06 A Capitals goal came off the board on review (off side)Overturned goals +17% NJD –
2 P1 0:01 Aliaksei Protas scored on a snap shot from 5 feetShooting · 34% chance +13% WSH –
3 P2 15:04 Jesper Bratt scored on a snap shot from 19 feetShooting · 16% chance +17% NJD –
4 P2 2:27 Anthony Beauvillier scored on a snap shot from 13 feetShooting · 16% chance +21% WSH –
5 P3 13:00 Jesper Bratt scored on a wrist shot from 63 feetShooting · 1% chance +30% NJD –
6 P3 12:28 Cody Glass scored on a snap shot from 14 feetShooting · 10% chance +27% NJD –
7 P3 10:43 Alex Ovechkin scored on a wrist shot from 9 feetShooting · 10% chance +28% WSH –
8 OT The game turned hereThe Capitals won in overtimeOvertime · overtime is close to a coin flip +51% WSH –

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

Capitals 70% · Devils 30%

Final margin
Capitals by 1
Luck in goals
0.1 for the Capitals
Luck-adjusted margin
Capitals by 0.9
Replay with same day's form
Capitals 65% · Devils 35% 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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