luckadjusted
NHL Week 1 · 2026-27

2025-26 regular season · March 8, 2026 · SO

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

Wild at Avalanche, Mar 8, 2026: who deserved to win?

The Avalanche beat the Wild 3–2, and the replays lean their way: with the same day's form, they win 7 of 10. The Wild had the bounces: shooting alone was worth 32 points of win probability to the Wild.

The biggest swing (SO): the Avalanche won the shootout, worth 51 points of win probability to the Avalanche.

Final (SO)

Minnesota Wild 2
Colorado Avalanche 3

March 8, 2026 · Ball Arena

Luck index +26 Avalanche lucky · −26 Wild

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. Wild win 3, Avalanche win 7.

  1. 1 MIN 4 COL 1
  2. 2 MIN 2 COL 1
  3. 3 MIN 6 COL 5
  4. 4 MIN 7 COL 8
  5. 5 MIN 3 COL 5
  6. 6 MIN 1 COL 4
  7. 7 MIN 2 COL 5
  8. 8 MIN 2 COL 6
  9. 9 MIN 3 COL 8
  10. 10 MIN 1 COL 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 4,000 replays ended

Wild win 26% of them, Avalanche 74%. The line is what actually happened: Avalanche by 1.

Show as a table
Final margin in the replaysShare of replays
Wild by 3+6.4%
Wild by 25.3%
Wild by 114.5%
Avalanche by 114.5%
Avalanche by 210.3%
Avalanche by 3+48.9%

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 +0.6 goals to the Wild: the final margin was Avalanche by 1, without the luck Avalanche by 1.6. Luck shares are the fitted ones (how much of each kind is luck).
ShootingUnblocked attemptsGoalsExpected goalsAbove expected
Wild4722.61−0.61
Avalanche5324.73−2.73

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 18:40 Cross checking on the Wild (Quinn Hughes): 2 minutes on the power play +4% COL
P1 13:03 Hooking on the Wild (Zach Bogosian): 2 minutes on the power play +4% COL
P2 19:17 High sticking on the Wild (Ryan Hartman): 2 minutes on the power play +4% COL
P2 15:32 High sticking on the Avalanche (Nicolas Roy): 2 minutes on the power play +5% MIN
P3 15:47 Slashing on the Avalanche (Ross Colton): 2 minutes on the power play +5% MIN
P3 14:43 Slashing on the Wild (Yakov Trenin): 2 minutes on the power play +7% COL
P3 10:31 Slashing on the Wild (Kirill Kaprizov): 2 minutes on the power play +5% COL
P3 5:02 Slashing on the Avalanche (Valeri Nichushkin): 2 minutes on the power play +9% MIN
OT 1:03 Interference on the Avalanche (Nathan MacKinnon): 2 minutes on the power play +12% MIN

When it happened

Avalanche’ chance of winning

As low as 19% 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 Avalanche were ahead in it, below while the Wild were.
#WhenWhat happenedWin probability forNext drive
1 P2 7:41 Nathan MacKinnon scored on a snap shot from 21 feetShooting · 13% chance +19% COL –
2 P3 15:43 Kirill Kaprizov scored on a wrist shot from 40 feetShooting · 5% chance +26% MIN –
3 P3 12:59 Nico Sturm scored on a wrist shot from 21 feetShooting · 14% chance +26% MIN –
4 P3 9:23 Martin Necas’s between-the-legs shot from 8 feet was savedShooting · 38% chanceBrock Nelson missed the net with a wrist shot from 8 feetShooting · 24% chance +20% MIN –
5 P3 7:21 Nicolas Roy scored on a tip from 12 feetShooting · 7% chance +33% COL –
6 P3 3:26 Jared Spurgeon’s snap shot from 14 feet was savedShooting · 23% chance +10% COL –
7 SO The Avalanche won the shootoutShootout · shootouts are close to coin flips +51% COL –
8 OT 1:03 Interference on the Avalanche (Nathan MacKinnon): 2 minutes on the power playPenalty calls +12% MIN –

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

Wild 22% · Avalanche 78%

Final margin
Avalanche by 1
Luck in goals
0.6 for the Wild
Luck-adjusted margin
Avalanche by 1.6
Replay with same day's form
Wild 26% · Avalanche 74% 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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