luckadjusted
NHL Week 1 · 2026-27

2025-26 regular season · January 18, 2026

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

Lightning at Stars, Jan 18, 2026: who deserved to win?

The Lightning beat the Stars 4–1, but the replays call it close to a coin flip: with the way both teams played, the Lightning win 5 of 10. Luck ran their way: shooting alone was worth 27 points of win probability to the Lightning.

The biggest swing (P2, 8:56 left): Brandon Hagel scored on a wrist shot from 7 feet, worth 18 points of win probability to the Lightning.

Final

Tampa Bay Lightning 4
Dallas Stars 1

January 18, 2026 · American Airlines Center

Luck index +47 Lightning lucky · −47 Stars

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. Lightning win 5, Stars win 5.

  1. 1 TBL 7 DAL 3
  2. 2 TBL 7 DAL 4
  3. 3 TBL 5 DAL 3
  4. 4 TBL 2 DAL 1
  5. 5 TBL 2 DAL 1
  6. 6 TBL 2 DAL 3
  7. 7 TBL 1 DAL 2
  8. 8 TBL 2 DAL 4
  9. 9 TBL 0 DAL 3
  10. 10 TBL 2 DAL 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 3,999.9 replays ended

Lightning win 53% of them, Stars 47%. The line is what actually happened: Lightning by 3.

Show as a table
Final margin in the replaysShare of replays
Lightning by 3+22.3%
Lightning by 210.7%
Lightning by 120.3%
Stars by 122.0%
Stars by 29.1%
Stars by 3+15.6%

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 +1.3 goals to the Lightning: the final margin was Lightning by 3, without the luck Lightning by 1.7. Luck shares are the fitted ones (how much of each kind is luck).
ShootingUnblocked attemptsGoalsExpected goalsAbove expected
Lightning3932.97+0.03
Stars2612.74−1.74

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 14:36 Hooking on the Lightning (Erik Cernak): 2 minutes on the power play +3% DAL
P2 13:44 Hooking on the Stars (Jason Robertson): 2 minutes on the power play +5% TBL
P2 5:40 Interference on the Lightning (Erik Cernak): 2 minutes on the power play +5% DAL
P3 12:34 Interference on the Stars (Colin Blackwell): 2 minutes on the power play +2% TBL

When it happened

Stars’ chance of winning

As low as 0% and as high as 70%. 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 Stars were ahead in it, below while the Lightning were.
#WhenWhat happenedWin probability forNext drive
1 P1 16:00 Oskar Bäck scored on a snap shot from 3 feetShooting · 49% chance +8% DAL –
2 P1 11:56 Dominic James scored on a snap shot from 23 feetShooting · 11% chance +15% TBL –
3 P1 0:42 Jason Robertson’s snap shot from 17 feet was savedShooting · 25% chance +5% TBL –
4 P2 13:44 Hooking on the Stars (Jason Robertson): 2 minutes on the power playPenalty calls +5% TBL –
5 P2 8:56 Brandon Hagel scored on a wrist shot from 7 feetShooting · 16% chance +18% TBL –
6 P2 5:40 Interference on the Lightning (Erik Cernak): 2 minutes on the power playPenalty calls +5% DAL –
7 P2 5:27 Roope Hintz’s snap shot from 13 feet was savedShooting · 22% chance +5% TBL –
8 P2 1:10 Jake Guentzel scored on a backhand shot from 12 feetShooting · 9% chance +15% TBL –

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

Lightning 84% · Stars 16%

Final margin
Lightning by 3
Luck in goals
1.3 for the Lightning
Luck-adjusted margin
Lightning by 1.7
Replay with same day's form
Lightning 53% · Stars 47% 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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