luckadjusted
NHL Week 1 · 2026-27

2025-26 regular season · December 31, 2025

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

Devils at Blue Jackets, Dec 31, 2025: who deserved to win?

The Devils beat the Blue Jackets 3–2, but the replays lean toward the Blue Jackets: they take 7 of 10 with the same day's form. Luck ran their way: shooting alone was worth 36 points of win probability to the Devils.

The game turned on a luck play (P3, 16:16 left): Arseny Gritsyuk scored on a snap shot from 44 feet, worth 26 points of win probability to the Devils.

Final

New Jersey Devils 3
Columbus Blue Jackets 2

December 31, 2025 · Nationwide Arena

Luck index +69 Devils very lucky · −69 Blue Jackets

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. Devils win 3, Blue Jackets win 7.

  1. 1 NJD 4 CBJ 1
  2. 2 NJD 4 CBJ 3
  3. 3 NJD 3 CBJ 2
  4. 4 NJD 3 CBJ 4
  5. 5 NJD 5 CBJ 6
  6. 6 NJD 2 CBJ 4
  7. 7 NJD 1 CBJ 4
  8. 8 NJD 0 CBJ 3
  9. 9 NJD 0 CBJ 4
  10. 10 NJD 2 CBJ 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 4,000.1 replays ended

Devils win 31% of them, Blue Jackets 69%. The line is what actually happened: Devils by 1.

Show as a table
Final margin in the replaysShare of replays
Devils by 3+6.6%
Devils by 26.0%
Devils by 118.2%
Blue Jackets by 118.6%
Blue Jackets by 212.3%
Blue Jackets by 3+38.3%

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 +1.6 goals to the Devils: the final margin was Devils by 1, without the luck Blue Jackets by 0.6. Luck shares are the fitted ones (how much of each kind is luck).
ShootingUnblocked attemptsGoalsExpected goalsAbove expected
Devils4232.32+0.68
Blue Jackets5823.91−1.91

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 4:51 Tripping on the Devils (Dougie Hamilton): 2 minutes on the power play +4% CBJ
P2 8:51 Tripping on the Devils (Dougie Hamilton): 2 minutes on the power play +4% CBJ
P3 17:15 Hooking on the Blue Jackets (Kirill Marchenko): 2 minutes on the power play +2% NJD
P3 4:54 Interference on the Devils (Brenden Dillon): 2 minutes on the power play +6% CBJ

When it happened

Blue Jackets’ chance of winning

As low as 0% and as high as 93%. 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 Blue Jackets were ahead in it, below while the Devils were.
#WhenWhat happenedWin probability forNext drive
1 P1 13:42 Mason Marchment scored on a wrist shot from 8 feetShooting · 10% chance +14% CBJ –
2 P2 6:19 Charlie Coyle scored on a snap shot from 10 feetShooting · 11% chance +13% CBJ –
3 P3 17:11 Nico Hischier scored on a snap shot from 22 feetShooting · 23% chance +11% NJD –
4 P3 16:16 The game turned hereArseny Gritsyuk scored on a snap shot from 44 feetShooting · 4% chance +26% NJD –
5 P3 15:34 Cody Glass’s snap shot from 3 feet was savedShooting · 31% chance +9% CBJ –
6 P3 15:15 Luke Hughes scored on a snap shot from 26 feetShooting · 11% chance +25% NJD –
7 P3 8:34 Kirill Marchenko missed the net with a snap shot from 8 feetShooting · 23% chance +8% NJD –
8 P3 4:54 Interference on the Devils (Brenden Dillon): 2 minutes on the power playPenalty calls +6% CBJ –

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

Devils 36% · Blue Jackets 64%

Final margin
Devils by 1
Luck in goals
1.6 for the Devils
Luck-adjusted margin
Blue Jackets by 0.6
Replay with same day's form
Devils 31% · Blue Jackets 69% 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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