2025-26 regular season · January 20, 2026
No betting line for this game, so there is no before-puck-drop or fresh-game number.
Sharks at Lightning, Jan 20, 2026: who deserved to win?
The Lightning beat the Sharks 4–1, and the replays lean their way: with the same day's form, they win 7 of 10.
The biggest swing (P1, 4:50 left): Brandon Hagel scored on a tip from 8 feet, worth 16 points of win probability to the Lightning.
Final
 San Jose Sharks | 1 |
|---|---|
 Tampa Bay Lightning | 4 |
Replay with same day's form
Luck index +28 Lightning lucky · −28 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 3, Lightning win 7.
- 1 SJS 3 TBL 1
- 2 SJS 1 TBL 0
- 3 SJS 5 TBL 4
- 4 SJS 1 TBL 2
- 5 SJS 1 TBL 2
- 6 SJS 0 TBL 2
- 7 SJS 1 TBL 4
- 8 SJS 0 TBL 3
- 9 SJS 0 TBL 4
- 10 SJS 0 TBL 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
Sharks win 28% of them, Lightning 72%. The line is what actually happened: Lightning by 3.
Show as a table
| Final margin in the replays | Share of replays |
|---|---|
| Sharks by 3+ | 3.7% |
| Sharks by 2 | 5.0% |
| Sharks by 1 | 19.0% |
| Lightning by 1 | 23.3% |
| Lightning by 2 | 14.0% |
| Lightning by 3+ | 35.0% |
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.
| Shooting | Unblocked attempts | Goals | Expected goals | Above expected |
|---|---|---|---|---|
 Sharks | 27 | 1 | 1.08 | −0.08 |
 Lightning | 43 | 3 | 2.57 | +0.43 |
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 |
|---|---|---|
| P2 13:09 | Holding on the Sharks (Ryan Reaves): 2 minutes on the power play | +3% TBL |
| P2 7:03 | Interference bench on the Lightning (TBL): 2 minutes on the power play | +3% SJS |
When it happened
Lightning’ chance of winning
As low as 35% and as high as 100%. Numbers mark the biggest luck moments, listed below.
| # | When | What happened | Win probability for | Next drive |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | P1 5:23 | Tyler Toffoli scored on a deflected shot from 4 feetShooting · 18% chance | +15% SJS | – |
| 2 | P1 4:50 | Brandon Hagel scored on a tip from 8 feetShooting · 10% chance | +16% TBL | – |
| 3 | P2 19:14 | Jake Guentzel missed the net with a wrist shot from 14 feetShooting · 13% chance | +2% SJS | – |
| 4 | P2 18:30 | Yanni Gourde hit the left post with a snap shot from 14 feetShooting · 16% chance | +3% SJS | – |
| 5 | P2 18:11 | Anthony Cirelli scored on a poke shot from 5 feetShooting · 14% chance | +16% TBL | – |
| 6 | P2 16:43 | Jake Guentzel scored on a wrist shot from 15 feetShooting · 13% chance | +12% TBL | – |
| 7 | P2 13:09 | Holding on the Sharks (Ryan Reaves): 2 minutes on the power playPenalty calls | +3% TBL | – |
| 8 | P2 7:03 | Interference bench on the Lightning (TBL): 2 minutes on the power playPenalty calls | +3% SJS | – |
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 4% · Lightning 96%
- Final margin
- Lightning by 3
- Luck in goals
- 0.6 for the Lightning
- Luck-adjusted margin
- Lightning by 2.4
- Replay with same day's form
- Sharks 28% · Lightning 72% 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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