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.

Penguins at Red Wings, Jan 3, 2026: who deserved to win?

The Penguins beat the Red Wings 4–1, and the replays lean their way: with the same day's form, they win 7 of 10.

The biggest swing (P2, 4:54 left): Alex DeBrincat scored on a snap shot from 31 feet, worth 15 points of win probability to the Red Wings.

Final

Pittsburgh Penguins 4
Detroit Red Wings 1

January 3, 2026 · Little Caesars Arena

Luck index +33 Penguins lucky · −33 Red Wings

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. Penguins win 7, Red Wings win 3.

  1. 1 PIT 6 DET 1
  2. 2 PIT 4 DET 1
  3. 3 PIT 4 DET 1
  4. 4 PIT 4 DET 2
  5. 5 PIT 3 DET 2
  6. 6 PIT 3 DET 2
  7. 7 PIT 2 DET 1
  8. 8 PIT 0 DET 1
  9. 9 PIT 2 DET 3
  10. 10 PIT 1 DET 3

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 4,000.2 replays ended

Penguins win 67% of them, Red Wings 33%. The line is what actually happened: Penguins by 3.

Show as a table
Final margin in the replaysShare of replays
Penguins by 3+30.4%
Penguins by 214.3%
Penguins by 122.7%
Red Wings by 121.1%
Red Wings by 26.2%
Red Wings by 3+5.4%

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 +0.7 goals to the Penguins: the final margin was Penguins by 3, without the luck Penguins by 2.3. Luck shares are the fitted ones (how much of each kind is luck).
ShootingUnblocked attemptsGoalsExpected goalsAbove expected
Penguins4122.67−0.67
Red Wings2811.45−0.45

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 12:15 Holding on the Penguins (Brett Kulak): 2 minutes on the power play +4% DET
P1 11:13 High sticking on the Red Wings (Moritz Seider): 2 minutes on the power play +4% PIT
P2 3:19 Hooking on the Penguins (Tommy Novak): 2 minutes on the power play +5% DET
P3 19:26 Hooking on the Red Wings (Simon Edvinsson): 2 minutes on the power play +5% PIT

When it happened

Red Wings’ chance of winning

As low as 0% and as high as 54%. 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 Red Wings were ahead in it, below while the Penguins were.
#WhenWhat happenedWin probability forNext drive
1 P1 16:16 Bryan Rust scored on a wrist shot from 21 feetShooting · 9% chance +15% PIT –
2 P1 11:13 High sticking on the Red Wings (Moritz Seider): 2 minutes on the power playPenalty calls +4% PIT –
3 P1 2:30 Egor Chinakhov scored on a wrist shot from 23 feetShooting · 11% chance +14% PIT –
4 P2 4:54 Alex DeBrincat scored on a snap shot from 31 feetShooting · 9% chance +15% DET –
5 P2 3:19 Hooking on the Penguins (Tommy Novak): 2 minutes on the power playPenalty calls +5% DET –
6 P2 2:37 Dylan Larkin’s wrist shot from 24 feet was savedShooting · 15% chance +4% PIT –
7 P3 19:26 Hooking on the Red Wings (Simon Edvinsson): 2 minutes on the power playPenalty calls +5% PIT –
8 P3 17:54 Justin Brazeau missed the net with a slap shot from 6 feetShooting · 40% chance +6% DET –

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

Penguins 92% · Red Wings 8%

Final margin
Penguins by 3
Luck in goals
0.7 for the Penguins
Luck-adjusted margin
Penguins by 2.3
Replay with same day's form
Penguins 67% · Red Wings 33% 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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