2025-26 regular season · January 6, 2026
No betting line for this game, so there is no before-puck-drop or fresh-game number.
Devils at Islanders, Jan 6, 2026: who deserved to win?
The Islanders beat the Devils 9–0, but the replays lean toward the Devils: they take 7 of 10 with the same day's form. Luck ran their way: shooting alone was worth 28 points of win probability to the Islanders.
The biggest swing (P1, 18:52 left): Mathew Barzal scored on a snap shot from 28 feet, worth 14 points of win probability to the Islanders.
Final
 New Jersey Devils | 0 |
|---|---|
 New York Islanders | 9 |
Replay with same day's form
Luck index +66 Islanders very lucky · −66 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. Devils win 7, Islanders win 3.
- 1 NJD 7 NYI 1
- 2 NJD 6 NYI 2
- 3 NJD 4 NYI 1
- 4 NJD 5 NYI 2
- 5 NJD 2 NYI 0
- 6 NJD 4 NYI 3
- 7 NJD 1 NYI 0
- 8 NJD 2 NYI 3
- 9 NJD 2 NYI 3
- 10 NJD 2 NYI 5
Three other ways to ask
Each answers a different question, so none of them replaces the replay above.
Before puck drop
No closing line for this game.
Same teams, fresh game
Needs the closing line, which this game has not got.
Only coin-flips re-rolled
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
Devils win 66% of them, Islanders 34%. The line is what actually happened: Islanders by 9.
Show as a table
| Final margin in the replays | Share of replays |
|---|---|
| Devils by 3+ | 35.0% |
| Devils by 2 | 12.4% |
| Devils by 1 | 19.0% |
| Islanders by 1 | 19.8% |
| Islanders by 2 | 6.4% |
| Islanders by 3+ | 7.4% |
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.
| Shooting | Unblocked attempts | Goals | Expected goals | Above expected |
|---|---|---|---|---|
 Devils | 63 | 0 | 3.51 | −3.51 |
 Islanders | 29 | 9 | 1.71 | +7.29 |
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.
| When | Call | Win probability for |
|---|---|---|
| P1 18:35 | Slashing on the Islanders (Ryan Pulock): 2 minutes on the power play | +3% NJD |
| P2 15:55 | Tripping on the Islanders (Matthew Schaefer): 2 minutes on the power play | +1% NJD |
| P2 0:41 | Delaying game puck over glass on the Islanders (Matthew Schaefer): 2 minutes on the power play | 0% NJD |
When it happened
Islanders’ chance of winning
Numbers mark the biggest luck moments, listed below.
| # | When | What happened | Win probability for | Next drive |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | P1 18:52 | Mathew Barzal scored on a snap shot from 28 feetShooting · 6% chance | +14% NYI | – |
| 2 | P1 18:35 | Slashing on the Islanders (Ryan Pulock): 2 minutes on the power playPenalty calls | +3% NJD | – |
| 3 | P1 18:18 | Nico Hischier’s tip from 20 feet was savedShooting · 12% chance | +2% NYI | – |
| 4 | P1 17:01 | Timo Meier’s wrist shot from 21 feet was savedShooting · 9% chance | +1% NYI | – |
| 5 | P1 15:59 | Anthony Duclair scored on a wrist shot from 29 feetShooting · 5% chance | +12% NYI | – |
| 6 | P1 10:32 | Brett Pesce’s snap shot from 19 feet was savedShooting · 13% chance | +2% NYI | – |
| 7 | P1 6:29 | Anthony Duclair scored on a wrist shot from 37 feetShooting · 4% chance | +8% NYI | – |
| 8 | P2 16:31 | Anthony Duclair scored on a snap shot from 34 feetShooting · 4% chance | +3% NYI | – |
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 30% · Islanders 70%
- Final margin
- Islanders by 9
- Luck in goals
- 8.1 for the Islanders
- Luck-adjusted margin
- Islanders by 0.9
- Replay with same day's form
- Devils 66% · Islanders 34% unchanged: why
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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