luckadjusted
NHL Week 1 · 2026-27

2025-26 regular season · March 2, 2026

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

Stars at Canucks, Mar 2, 2026: who deserved to win?

The Stars beat the Canucks 6–1, and the replays back it up: with the way both teams actually played, the Stars win 8 of 10.

The biggest swing (P2, 11:29 left): Lian Bichsel scored on a snap shot from 23 feet, worth 18 points of win probability to the Stars.

Final

Dallas Stars 6
Vancouver Canucks 1

March 2, 2026 · Rogers Arena

Luck index +19 Stars about even · −19 Canucks

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. Stars win 8, Canucks win 2.

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

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

Stars win 81% of them, Canucks 19%. The line is what actually happened: Stars by 5.

Show as a table
Final margin in the replaysShare of replays
Stars by 3+56.4%
Stars by 211.0%
Stars by 114.0%
Canucks by 113.0%
Canucks by 23.5%
Canucks by 3+2.1%

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 +1.6 goals to the Stars: the final margin was Stars by 5, without the luck Stars by 3.4. Luck shares are the fitted ones (how much of each kind is luck).
ShootingUnblocked attemptsGoalsExpected goalsAbove expected
Stars5364.11+1.89
Canucks2111.28−0.28

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 10:29 Roughing on the Stars (Jamie Benn): 2 minutes on the power play +3% VAN
P2 11:12 Delaying game puck over glass on the Canucks (Filip Hronek): 2 minutes on the power play +4% DAL
P3 7:54 Holding on the Canucks (Tom Willander): 2 minutes on the power play 0% DAL
P3 7:15 Tripping on the Stars (Jamie Benn): 2 minutes on the power play 0% VAN

When it happened

Canucks’ chance of winning

As low as 0% and as high as 71%. 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 Stars were.
#WhenWhat happenedWin probability forNext drive
1 P1 12:03 Evander Kane scored on a deflected shot from 2 feetShooting · 44% chance +9% VAN –
2 P1 10:29 Roughing on the Stars (Jamie Benn): 2 minutes on the power playPenalty calls +3% VAN –
3 P1 3:41 Wyatt Johnston’s poke shot from 4 feet was savedShooting · 20% chance +3% VAN –
4 P1 2:20 Adam Erne scored on a snap shot from 26 feetShooting · 10% chance +16% DAL –
5 P2 11:29 Lian Bichsel scored on a snap shot from 23 feetShooting · 14% chance +18% DAL –
6 P2 11:12 Delaying game puck over glass on the Canucks (Filip Hronek): 2 minutes on the power playPenalty calls +4% DAL –
7 P2 10:19 Jason Robertson scored on a slap shot from 35 feetShooting · 14% chance +14% DAL –
8 P3 18:27 Matt Duchene scored on a snap shot from 22 feetShooting · 9% chance +6% DAL –

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

Stars 99% · Canucks 1%

Final margin
Stars by 5
Luck in goals
1.6 for the Stars
Luck-adjusted margin
Stars by 3.4
Replay with same day's form
Stars 81% · Canucks 19% 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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