luckadjusted
NHL Week 1 · 2026-27

2025-26 regular season · January 3, 2026

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

Canadiens at Blues, Jan 3, 2026: who deserved to win?

The Blues beat the Canadiens 2–0, but the replays call it close to a coin flip: with the way both teams played, the Blues win 4 of 10. Luck ran their way: goaltending alone was worth 35 points of win probability to the Blues.

The biggest swing (P1, 9:12 left): Jonatan Berggren scored on a snap shot from 22 feet, worth 15 points of win probability to the Blues.

Final

Montreal Canadiens 0
St. Louis Blues 2

January 3, 2026 · Enterprise Center

Luck index +55 Blues lucky · −55 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. Canadiens win 6, Blues win 4.

  1. 1 MTL 4 STL 0
  2. 2 MTL 4 STL 1
  3. 3 MTL 3 STL 1
  4. 4 MTL 3 STL 2
  5. 5 MTL 3 STL 2
  6. 6 MTL 4 STL 3
  7. 7 MTL 4 STL 5
  8. 8 MTL 3 STL 4
  9. 9 MTL 1 STL 3
  10. 10 MTL 2 STL 5

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

Canadiens win 55% of them, Blues 45%. The line is what actually happened: Blues by 2.

Show as a table
Final margin in the replaysShare of replays
Canadiens by 3+21.6%
Canadiens by 212.1%
Canadiens by 121.7%
Blues by 122.2%
Blues by 29.4%
Blues by 3+13.0%

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 +1.3 goals to the Blues: the final margin was Blues by 2, without the luck Blues by 0.7. Luck shares are the fitted ones (how much of each kind is luck).
ShootingUnblocked attemptsGoalsExpected goalsAbove expected
Canadiens4803.28−3.28
Blues2622.12−0.12

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 17:33 High sticking on the Canadiens (Noah Dobson): 2 minutes on the power play +4% STL
P2 10:58 Tripping on the Blues (Pavel Buchnevich): 2 minutes on the power play +4% MTL
P2 6:40 Tripping on the Blues (Brayden Schenn): 2 minutes on the power play +3% MTL
P2 6:17 High sticking on the Blues (Colton Parayko): 2 minutes on the power play +3% MTL
P2 4:24 Hooking on the Canadiens (Brendan Gallagher): 2 minutes on the power play +3% STL
P3 17:46 High sticking on the Blues (Pavel Buchnevich): 2 minutes on the power play +2% MTL

When it happened

Blues’ chance of winning

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 Blues were ahead in it, below while the Canadiens were.
#WhenWhat happenedWin probability forNext drive
1 P1 17:33 High sticking on the Canadiens (Noah Dobson): 2 minutes on the power playPenalty calls +4% STL –
2 P1 15:31 Jake Neighbours’s wrist shot from 8 feet was savedShooting · 16% chance +3% MTL –
3 P1 9:12 Jonatan Berggren scored on a snap shot from 22 feetShooting · 11% chance +15% STL –
4 P2 10:58 Tripping on the Blues (Pavel Buchnevich): 2 minutes on the power playPenalty calls +4% MTL –
5 P2 9:47 Robert Thomas scored on a backhand shot from 14 feetShooting · 9% chance +13% STL –
6 P2 6:40 Tripping on the Blues (Brayden Schenn): 2 minutes on the power playPenalty calls +3% MTL –
7 P2 6:17 High sticking on the Blues (Colton Parayko): 2 minutes on the power playPenalty calls +3% MTL –
8 P3 15:28 Sammy Blais’s snap shot from 7 feet was savedShooting · 19% chance +3% STL –

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

Canadiens 35% · Blues 65%

Final margin
Blues by 2
Luck in goals
1.3 for the Blues
Luck-adjusted margin
Blues by 0.7
Replay with same day's form
Canadiens 55% · Blues 45% 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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