luckadjusted
NHL Week 1 · 2026-27

2025-26 regular season · March 22, 2026

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

Hurricanes at Penguins, Mar 22, 2026: who deserved to win?

The Hurricanes beat the Penguins 5–1, and the replays lean their way: with the same day's form, they win 7 of 10.

The biggest swing (P2, 13:36 left): Nikolaj Ehlers scored on a slap shot from 51 feet, worth 15 points of win probability to the Hurricanes.

Final

Carolina Hurricanes 5
Pittsburgh Penguins 1

March 22, 2026 · PPG Paints Arena

Luck index +34 Hurricanes lucky · −34 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. Hurricanes win 7, Penguins win 3.

  1. 1 CAR 6 PIT 0
  2. 2 CAR 7 PIT 3
  3. 3 CAR 4 PIT 1
  4. 4 CAR 7 PIT 4
  5. 5 CAR 2 PIT 0
  6. 6 CAR 4 PIT 3
  7. 7 CAR 2 PIT 1
  8. 8 CAR 1 PIT 2
  9. 9 CAR 2 PIT 3
  10. 10 CAR 4 PIT 7

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

Hurricanes win 66% of them, Penguins 34%. The line is what actually happened: Hurricanes by 4.

Show as a table
Final margin in the replaysShare of replays
Hurricanes by 3+36.8%
Hurricanes by 211.6%
Hurricanes by 117.8%
Penguins by 118.9%
Penguins by 26.1%
Penguins by 3+8.8%

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 +0.2 goals to the Hurricanes: the final margin was Hurricanes by 4, without the luck Hurricanes by 3.8. Luck shares are the fitted ones (how much of each kind is luck).
ShootingUnblocked attemptsGoalsExpected goalsAbove expected
Hurricanes4943.62+0.38
Penguins3412.53−1.53

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 19:35 Tripping on the Penguins (Ryan Graves): 2 minutes on the power play +4% CAR
P2 14:36 Cross checking on the Penguins (Samuel Girard): 2 minutes on the power play +4% CAR
P2 9:20 Tripping on the Hurricanes (Mike Reilly): 2 minutes on the power play +1% PIT
P2 3:21 Roughing on the Penguins (Anthony Mantha): 2 minutes on the power play +1% CAR
P3 12:32 Slashing on the Penguins (Erik Karlsson): 2 minutes on the power play 0% CAR
P3 7:20 High sticking on the Penguins (Elmer Soderblom): 2 minutes on the power play 0% CAR
P3 0:38 Tripping on the Hurricanes (Mike Reilly): 2 minutes on the power play 0% PIT

When it happened

Penguins’ chance of winning

As low as 0% and as high as 54%. 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 Penguins were ahead in it, below while the Hurricanes were.
#WhenWhat happenedWin probability forNext drive
1 P1 19:38 Nikolaj Ehlers’s wrist shot from 12 feet was savedShooting · 13% chance +2% PIT –
2 P1 19:35 Tripping on the Penguins (Ryan Graves): 2 minutes on the power playPenalty calls +4% CAR –
3 P1 19:13 Sebastian Aho scored on a wrist shot from 46 feetShooting · 3% chance +15% CAR –
4 P1 2:14 Andrei Svechnikov missed the net with a slap shot from 8 feetShooting · 24% chance +4% PIT –
5 P2 15:58 Tommy Novak’s backhand shot from 17 feet was savedShooting · 11% chance +2% CAR –
6 P2 14:36 Cross checking on the Penguins (Samuel Girard): 2 minutes on the power playPenalty calls +4% CAR –
7 P2 13:36 Nikolaj Ehlers scored on a slap shot from 51 feetShooting · 4% chance +15% CAR –
8 P2 10:45 Jalen Chatfield scored on a slap shot from 63 feetShooting · 2% chance +9% 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

Hurricanes 97% · Penguins 3%

Final margin
Hurricanes by 4
Luck in goals
0.2 for the Hurricanes
Luck-adjusted margin
Hurricanes by 3.8
Replay with same day's form
Hurricanes 66% · Penguins 34% 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.

All week 24 2025-26 games · Hurricanes · Penguins

More from week 24, 2025-26

Every game of week 24, 2025-26