luckadjusted
NHL Week 1 · 2026-27

2025-26 regular season · March 21, 2026

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

Islanders at Canadiens, Mar 21, 2026: who deserved to win?

The Canadiens beat the Islanders 7–3, and the replays lean their way: with the same day's form, they win 7 of 10. The Islanders had the bounces: goaltending alone was worth 20 points of win probability to the Islanders.

The biggest swing (P3, 16:43 left): Kaiden Guhle scored on a slap shot from 62 feet, worth 26 points of win probability to the Canadiens.

Final

New York Islanders 3
Montreal Canadiens 7

March 21, 2026 · Centre Bell

Luck index +27 Canadiens lucky · −27 Islanders

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. Islanders win 3, Canadiens win 7.

  1. 1 NYI 6 MTL 3
  2. 2 NYI 3 MTL 2
  3. 3 NYI 1 MTL 0
  4. 4 NYI 3 MTL 4
  5. 5 NYI 0 MTL 1
  6. 6 NYI 2 MTL 4
  7. 7 NYI 0 MTL 3
  8. 8 NYI 1 MTL 4
  9. 9 NYI 0 MTL 4
  10. 10 NYI 0 MTL 6

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

Islanders win 27% of them, Canadiens 73%. The line is what actually happened: Canadiens by 4.

Show as a table
Final margin in the replaysShare of replays
Islanders by 3+6.2%
Islanders by 25.4%
Islanders by 115.6%
Canadiens by 118.2%
Canadiens by 211.4%
Canadiens by 3+43.2%

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 Canadiens: the final margin was Canadiens by 4, without the luck Canadiens by 2.4. Luck shares are the fitted ones (how much of each kind is luck).
ShootingUnblocked attemptsGoalsExpected goalsAbove expected
Islanders3032.20+0.80
Canadiens5474.01+2.99

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 16:29 Slashing on the Islanders (Casey Cizikas): 2 minutes on the power play +4% MTL
P1 14:55 Roughing on the Canadiens (Kaiden Guhle): 2 minutes on the power play +3% NYI
P1 4:47 Slashing on the Islanders (Tony DeAngelo): 2 minutes on the power play +4% MTL
P2 15:58 Hooking on the Canadiens (Noah Dobson): 2 minutes on the power play +4% NYI
P2 1:37 Interference on the Islanders (Tony DeAngelo): 2 minutes on the power play +6% MTL
P2 0:07 Tripping on the Canadiens (Brendan Gallagher): 2 minutes on the power play +5% NYI
P3 5:32 Roughing on the Islanders (Mathew Barzal): 2 minutes on the power play 0% MTL

When it happened

Canadiens’ chance of winning

As low as 28% 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 Canadiens were ahead in it, below while the Islanders were.
#WhenWhat happenedWin probability forNext drive
1 P1 15:50 Juraj Slafkovský scored on a slap shot from 34 feetShooting · 12% chance +14% MTL –
2 P1 13:14 Emil Heineman scored on a snap shot from 32 feetShooting · 6% chance +15% NYI –
3 P1 6:41 Simon Holmstrom scored on a wrist shot from 5 feetShooting · 19% chance +14% NYI –
4 P2 2:11 Alex Newhook scored on a snap shot from 30 feetShooting · 4% chance +24% MTL –
5 P2 0:52 Cole Caufield scored on a snap shot from 12 feetShooting · 13% chance +21% MTL –
6 P3 19:15 Matthew Schaefer scored on a slap shot from 51 feetShooting · 5% chance +24% NYI –
7 P3 16:43 Kaiden Guhle scored on a slap shot from 62 feetShooting · 2% chance +26% MTL –
8 P3 11:52 Juraj Slafkovský scored on a snap shot from 17 feetShooting · 12% chance +12% MTL –

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

Islanders 12% · Canadiens 88%

Final margin
Canadiens by 4
Luck in goals
1.6 for the Canadiens
Luck-adjusted margin
Canadiens by 2.4
Replay with same day's form
Islanders 27% · Canadiens 73% 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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