luckadjusted
NHL Week 1 · 2026-27

2025-26 regular season · January 14, 2026 · OT

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

Golden Knights at Kings, Jan 14, 2026: who deserved to win?

The Golden Knights beat the Kings 3–2, but the replays lean toward the Kings: they take 6 of 10 with the same day's form. Luck ran their way: overtime alone was worth 51 points of win probability to the Golden Knights.

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

Final (OT)

Vegas Golden Knights 3
Los Angeles Kings 2

January 14, 2026 · Crypto.com Arena

Luck index +61 Golden Knights very lucky · −61 Kings

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. Golden Knights win 4, Kings win 6.

  1. 1 VGK 4 LAK 1
  2. 2 VGK 3 LAK 1
  3. 3 VGK 3 LAK 2
  4. 4 VGK 1 LAK 0
  5. 5 VGK 2 LAK 3
  6. 6 VGK 3 LAK 4
  7. 7 VGK 0 LAK 2
  8. 8 VGK 3 LAK 5
  9. 9 VGK 0 LAK 3
  10. 10 VGK 0 LAK 4

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 3,999.8 replays ended

Golden Knights win 39% of them, Kings 61%. The line is what actually happened: Golden Knights by 1.

Show as a table
Final margin in the replaysShare of replays
Golden Knights by 3+8.4%
Golden Knights by 27.3%
Golden Knights by 123.4%
Kings by 124.1%
Kings by 213.8%
Kings by 3+23.0%

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 +2.0 goals to the Golden Knights: the final margin was Golden Knights by 1, without the luck Kings by 1. Luck shares are the fitted ones (how much of each kind is luck).
ShootingUnblocked attemptsGoalsExpected goalsAbove expected
Golden Knights2921.62+0.38
Kings4022.96−0.96

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
P2 7:38 Slashing on the Golden Knights (Jack Eichel): 2 minutes on the power play +5% LAK
P2 6:03 Slashing on the Kings (Kevin Fiala): 2 minutes on the power play +5% VGK
P3 8:37 Hooking on the Kings (Adrian Kempe): 2 minutes on the power play +8% VGK

When it happened

Kings’ 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 Kings were ahead in it, below while the Golden Knights were.
#WhenWhat happenedWin probability forNext drive
1 P2 16:04 Braeden Bowman scored on a wrist shot from 10 feetShooting · 12% chance +18% VGK –
2 P2 7:11 Adrian Kempe’s wrist shot from 8 feet was savedShooting · 23% chance +5% VGK –
3 P3 13:36 Kevin Fiala scored on a snap shot from 13 feetShooting · 15% chance +25% LAK –
4 P3 8:37 Hooking on the Kings (Adrian Kempe): 2 minutes on the power playPenalty calls +8% VGK –
5 P3 7:53 Mitch Marner scored on a wrist shot from 24 feetShooting · 13% chance +30% VGK –
6 P3 1:28 Brandt Clarke’s wrist shot from 8 feet was savedShooting · 19% chance +8% VGK –
7 P3 1:27 Brandt Clarke scored on a wrist shot from 6 feetShooting · 24% chance +34% LAK –
8 OT The game turned hereThe Golden Knights won in overtimeOvertime · overtime is close to a coin flip +51% VGK –

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

Golden Knights 26% · Kings 74%

Final margin
Golden Knights by 1
Luck in goals
2.0 for the Golden Knights
Luck-adjusted margin
Kings by 1.0
Replay with same day's form
Golden Knights 39% · Kings 61% 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.

All week 15 2025-26 games · Golden Knights · Kings

More from week 15, 2025-26

Every game of week 15, 2025-26