luckadjusted
NHL Week 1 · 2026-27

2025-26 regular season · March 18, 2026 · OT

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

Penguins at Hurricanes, Mar 18, 2026: who deserved to win?

The Hurricanes beat the Penguins 6–5, but the replays call it close to a coin flip: with the way both teams played, the Hurricanes win 6 of 10. Luck ran their way: overtime alone was worth 49 points of win probability to the Hurricanes.

The biggest swing (OT): the Hurricanes won in overtime, worth 49 points of win probability to the Hurricanes.

Final (OT)

Pittsburgh Penguins 5
Carolina Hurricanes 6

March 18, 2026 · Lenovo Center

Luck index +43 Hurricanes lucky · −43 Penguins

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. Penguins win 4, Hurricanes win 6.

  1. 1 PIT 7 CAR 3
  2. 2 PIT 7 CAR 4
  3. 3 PIT 7 CAR 6
  4. 4 PIT 6 CAR 5
  5. 5 PIT 2 CAR 3
  6. 6 PIT 2 CAR 3
  7. 7 PIT 3 CAR 5
  8. 8 PIT 3 CAR 6
  9. 9 PIT 3 CAR 7
  10. 10 PIT 3 CAR 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 3,999.9 replays ended

Penguins win 43% of them, Hurricanes 57%. The line is what actually happened: Hurricanes by 1.

Show as a table
Final margin in the replaysShare of replays
Penguins by 3+16.9%
Penguins by 28.2%
Penguins by 117.8%
Hurricanes by 118.4%
Hurricanes by 210.5%
Hurricanes by 3+28.1%

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 +0.4 goals to the Hurricanes: the final margin was Hurricanes by 1, without the luck Hurricanes by 0.6. Luck shares are the fitted ones (how much of each kind is luck).
ShootingUnblocked attemptsGoalsExpected goalsAbove expected
Penguins3953.37+1.63
Hurricanes6454.08+0.92

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 10:36 Holding on the Hurricanes (Mark Jankowski): 2 minutes on the power play +4% PIT
P2 8:05 Hooking on the Hurricanes (K'Andre Miller): 2 minutes on the power play +5% PIT
P2 5:13 Tripping on the Penguins (Parker Wotherspoon): 2 minutes on the power play +5% CAR
P2 0:32 Holding the stick on the Hurricanes (Andrei Svechnikov): 2 minutes on the power play +5% PIT
P3 19:31 Tripping on the Hurricanes (Jordan Staal): 2 minutes on the power play +5% PIT
P3 7:43 Tripping on the Penguins (Sidney Crosby): 2 minutes on the power play +8% CAR

When it happened

Hurricanes’ chance of winning

As low as 11% 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 Hurricanes were ahead in it, below while the Penguins were.
#WhenWhat happenedWin probability forNext drive
1 P3 19:01 Erik Karlsson scored on a slap shot from 44 feetShooting · 6% chance +24% PIT –
2 P3 16:33 Taylor Hall scored on a backhand shot from 10 feetShooting · 11% chance +24% CAR –
3 P3 12:44 Bryan Rust scored on a backhand shot from 16 feetShooting · 10% chance +26% PIT –
4 P3 7:01 Logan Stankoven scored on a snap shot from 15 feetShooting · 22% chance +27% CAR –
5 P3 5:14 Erik Karlsson scored on a snap shot from 42 feetShooting · 4% chance +36% PIT –
6 P3 4:51 Ben Kindel scored on a snap shot from 23 feetShooting · 17% chance +32% PIT –
7 P3 2:51 K'Andre Miller scored on a snap shot from 31 feetShooting · 4% chance +40% CAR –
8 OT The Hurricanes won in overtimeOvertime · overtime is close to a coin flip +49% CAR –

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

Penguins 41% · Hurricanes 59%

Final margin
Hurricanes by 1
Luck in goals
0.4 for the Hurricanes
Luck-adjusted margin
Hurricanes by 0.6
Replay with same day's form
Penguins 43% · Hurricanes 57% 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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