luckadjusted
NHL Week 1 · 2026-27

2025-26 regular season · January 21, 2026

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

Capitals at Canucks, Jan 21, 2026: who deserved to win?

The Canucks beat the Capitals 4–3, but the replays lean toward the Capitals: they take 6 of 10 with the same day's form. Luck ran their way: shooting alone was worth 28 points of win probability to the Canucks.

The biggest swing (P2, 11:02 left): Drew O'Connor scored on a snap shot from 17 feet, worth 19 points of win probability to the Canucks.

Final

Washington Capitals 3
Vancouver Canucks 4

January 21, 2026 · Rogers Arena

Luck index +61 Canucks very lucky · −61 Capitals

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. Capitals win 6, Canucks win 4.

  1. 1 WSH 5 VAN 0
  2. 2 WSH 5 VAN 1
  3. 3 WSH 5 VAN 2
  4. 4 WSH 4 VAN 2
  5. 5 WSH 1 VAN 0
  6. 6 WSH 3 VAN 2
  7. 7 WSH 3 VAN 4
  8. 8 WSH 2 VAN 3
  9. 9 WSH 0 VAN 2
  10. 10 WSH 5 VAN 8

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

Capitals win 61% of them, Canucks 39%. The line is what actually happened: Canucks by 1.

Show as a table
Final margin in the replaysShare of replays
Capitals by 3+29.9%
Capitals by 211.7%
Capitals by 119.0%
Canucks by 120.1%
Canucks by 27.4%
Canucks by 3+11.8%

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 +1.2 goals to the Canucks: the final margin was Canucks by 1, without the luck Capitals by 0.2. Luck shares are the fitted ones (how much of each kind is luck).
ShootingUnblocked attemptsGoalsExpected goalsAbove expected
Capitals5233.89−0.89
Canucks3842.23+1.77

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 12:49 Holding on the Canucks (Max Sasson): 2 minutes on the power play +4% WSH
P1 11:58 High sticking on the Canucks (Marcus Pettersson): 2 minutes on the power play +4% WSH
P1 4:07 Holding on the Canucks (Linus Karlsson): 2 minutes on the power play +4% WSH
P2 16:27 Cross checking on the Capitals (John Carlson): 2 minutes on the power play +5% VAN
P2 15:41 Holding on the Capitals (Connor McMichael): 2 minutes on the power play +5% VAN
P2 4:48 Interference on the Capitals (Ryan Leonard): 2 minutes on the power play +3% VAN

When it happened

Canucks’ chance of winning

As low as 21% 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 Canucks were ahead in it, below while the Capitals were.
#WhenWhat happenedWin probability forNext drive
1 P1 11:35 Dylan Strome scored on a wrist shot from 7 feetShooting · 26% chance +13% WSH –
2 P1 6:28 Brock Boeser scored on a wrist shot from 19 feetShooting · 11% chance +14% VAN –
3 P1 1:38 Evander Kane scored on a wrist shot from 16 feetShooting · 2% chance +18% VAN –
4 P2 16:27 Cross checking on the Capitals (John Carlson): 2 minutes on the power playPenalty calls +5% VAN –
5 P2 15:41 Holding on the Capitals (Connor McMichael): 2 minutes on the power playPenalty calls +5% VAN –
6 P2 11:02 Drew O'Connor scored on a snap shot from 17 feetShooting · 6% chance +19% VAN –
7 P2 8:17 Filip Hronek scored on a tip from 10 feetShooting · 9% chance +13% VAN –
8 P3 3:23 Dylan Strome scored on a wrist shot from 7 feetShooting · 20% chance +6% WSH –

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

Capitals 52% · Canucks 48%

Final margin
Canucks by 1
Luck in goals
1.2 for the Canucks
Luck-adjusted margin
Capitals by 0.2
Replay with same day's form
Capitals 61% · Canucks 39% 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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