luckadjusted
NHL Week 1 · 2026-27

2025-26 regular season · January 11, 2026 · OT

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

Blue Jackets at Mammoth, Jan 11, 2026: who deserved to win?

The Blue Jackets beat the Mammoth 3–2, and the replays lean their way: with the same day's form, they win 7 of 10. The Mammoth had the bounces: goaltending alone was worth 49 points of win probability to the Mammoth.

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

Final (OT)

Columbus Blue Jackets 3
Utah Mammoth 2

January 11, 2026 · Delta Center

Luck index +27 Blue Jackets lucky · −27 Mammoth

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. Blue Jackets win 7, Mammoth win 3.

  1. 1 CBJ 8 UTA 1
  2. 2 CBJ 7 UTA 2
  3. 3 CBJ 8 UTA 4
  4. 4 CBJ 6 UTA 3
  5. 5 CBJ 3 UTA 0
  6. 6 CBJ 6 UTA 4
  7. 7 CBJ 3 UTA 2
  8. 8 CBJ 4 UTA 5
  9. 9 CBJ 4 UTA 5
  10. 10 CBJ 3 UTA 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

Blue Jackets win 73% of them, Mammoth 27%. The line is what actually happened: Blue Jackets by 1.

Show as a table
Final margin in the replaysShare of replays
Blue Jackets by 3+46.2%
Blue Jackets by 210.7%
Blue Jackets by 115.8%
Mammoth by 116.5%
Mammoth by 25.6%
Mammoth by 3+5.1%

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 +0.8 goals to the Mammoth: the final margin was Blue Jackets by 1, without the luck Blue Jackets by 1.8. Luck shares are the fitted ones (how much of each kind is luck).
ShootingUnblocked attemptsGoalsExpected goalsAbove expected
Blue Jackets4924.58−2.58
Mammoth4122.14−0.14

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 10:15 Holding on the Blue Jackets (Dmitri Voronkov): 2 minutes on the power play +4% UTA
P2 2:31 Holding on the Mammoth (Jack McBain): 2 minutes on the power play +4% CBJ
P3 19:41 Slashing on the Mammoth (Jack McBain): 2 minutes on the power play +6% CBJ
P3 17:56 Tripping on the Blue Jackets (Boone Jenner): 2 minutes on the power play +6% UTA
P3 0:24 Tripping on the Mammoth (Daniil But): 2 minutes on the power play +11% CBJ

When it happened

Mammoth’ chance of winning

As low as 0% and as high as 76%. 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 Mammoth were ahead in it, below while the Blue Jackets were.
#WhenWhat happenedWin probability forNext drive
1 P1 17:13 Mikael Pyyhtia scored on a wrist shot from 26 feetShooting · 6% chance +15% CBJ –
2 P1 3:40 Jack McBain scored on a deflected shot from 8 feetShooting · 8% chance +17% UTA –
3 P2 18:58 Mikhail Sergachev scored on a snap shot from 61 feetShooting · 2% chance +18% UTA –
4 P2 1:31 Adam Fantilli’s wrist shot from 6 feet was savedShooting · 29% chance +7% UTA –
5 P2 1:30 Adam Fantilli’s wrist shot from 4 feet was savedShooting · 42% chance +10% UTA –
6 P3 17:20 JJ Peterka missed the net with a wrist shot from 7 feetShooting · 25% chance +7% CBJ –
7 P3 0:24 Tripping on the Mammoth (Daniil But): 2 minutes on the power playPenalty calls +11% CBJ –
8 OT The game turned hereThe Blue Jackets won in overtimeOvertime · overtime is close to a coin flip +51% 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

Blue Jackets 86% · Mammoth 14%

Final margin
Blue Jackets by 1
Luck in goals
0.8 for the Mammoth
Luck-adjusted margin
Blue Jackets by 1.8
Replay with same day's form
Blue Jackets 73% · Mammoth 27% 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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