luckadjusted
NHL Week 1 · 2026-27

2025-26 regular season · January 16, 2026

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

Sharks at Red Wings, Jan 16, 2026: who deserved to win?

The Red Wings beat the Sharks 4–2, but the replays call it close to a coin flip: with the way both teams played, the Red Wings win 6 of 10. Luck ran their way: goaltending alone was worth 25 points of win probability to the Red Wings.

The biggest swing (P3, 15:19 left): Dylan Larkin scored on a backhand shot from 3 feet, worth 23 points of win probability to the Red Wings.

Final

San Jose Sharks 2
Detroit Red Wings 4

January 16, 2026 · Little Caesars Arena

Luck index +43 Red Wings lucky · −43 Sharks

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. Sharks win 4, Red Wings win 6.

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

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

Sharks win 43% of them, Red Wings 57%. The line is what actually happened: Red Wings by 2.

Show as a table
Final margin in the replaysShare of replays
Sharks by 3+15.8%
Sharks by 28.3%
Sharks by 119.2%
Red Wings by 119.3%
Red Wings by 210.4%
Red Wings by 3+26.9%

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 Red Wings: the final margin was Red Wings by 2, without the luck Red Wings by 1.2. Luck shares are the fitted ones (how much of each kind is luck).
ShootingUnblocked attemptsGoalsExpected goalsAbove expected
Sharks2823.21−1.21
Red Wings4833.81−0.81

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 14:16 High sticking on the Sharks (Mario Ferraro): 2 minutes on the power play +4% DET
P2 1:40 Hooking on the Sharks (Sam Dickinson): 2 minutes on the power play +6% DET
P3 8:26 High sticking on the Red Wings (Michael Rasmussen): 2 minutes on the power play +5% SJS

When it happened

Red Wings’ chance of winning

As low as 33% and as high as 100%. 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 Sharks were.
#WhenWhat happenedWin probability forNext drive
1 P1 13:53 Dylan Larkin’s slap shot from 21 feet was savedShooting · 25% chanceJames van Riemsdyk hit the right post with a slap shot from 6 feetShooting · 37% chance +10% SJS –
2 P1 13:42 Alex DeBrincat scored on a snap shot from 27 feetShooting · 12% chance +14% DET –
3 P2 18:02 Collin Graf scored on a tip from 12 feetShooting · 8% chance +18% SJS –
4 P2 13:05 J.T. Compher scored on a snap shot from 9 feetShooting · 15% chance +18% DET –
5 P2 1:40 Hooking on the Sharks (Sam Dickinson): 2 minutes on the power playPenalty calls +6% DET –
6 P3 15:19 Dylan Larkin scored on a backhand shot from 3 feetShooting · 15% chance +23% DET –
7 P3 5:28 William Eklund’s snap shot from 19 feet was savedShooting · 16% chance +6% DET –
8 P3 3:40 Collin Graf’s wrist shot from 7 feet was savedShooting · 19% chance +7% 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

Sharks 28% · Red Wings 72%

Final margin
Red Wings by 2
Luck in goals
0.8 for the Red Wings
Luck-adjusted margin
Red Wings by 1.2
Replay with same day's form
Sharks 43% · Red Wings 57% 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 · Sharks · Red Wings

More from week 15, 2025-26

Every game of week 15, 2025-26