luckadjusted
NHL Week 1 · 2026-27

2025-26 regular season · March 24, 2026

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

Devils at Stars, Mar 24, 2026: who deserved to win?

The Devils beat the Stars 6–4, and the replays lean their way: with the same day's form, they win 6 of 10.

The biggest swing (P2, 7:29 left): Jason Robertson scored on a snap shot from 10 feet, worth 15 points of win probability to the Stars.

Final

New Jersey Devils 6
Dallas Stars 4

March 24, 2026 · American Airlines Center

Luck index +37 Devils lucky · −37 Stars

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. Devils win 6, Stars win 4.

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

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 3,999.8 replays ended

Devils win 63% of them, Stars 37%. The line is what actually happened: Devils by 2.

Show as a table
Final margin in the replaysShare of replays
Devils by 3+31.5%
Devils by 211.2%
Devils by 119.9%
Stars by 119.8%
Stars by 27.2%
Stars by 3+10.4%

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 +0.1 goals to the Stars: the final margin was Devils by 2, without the luck Devils by 2.1. Luck shares are the fitted ones (how much of each kind is luck).
ShootingUnblocked attemptsGoalsExpected goalsAbove expected
Devils3153.17+1.83
Stars4142.48+1.52

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 12:14 Hooking on the Devils (Timo Meier): 2 minutes on the power play +4% DAL
P1 11:59 Hooking on the Stars (Miro Heiskanen): 2 minutes on the power play +4% NJD
P2 19:00 Tripping on the Devils (Lenni Hameenaho): 2 minutes on the power play +2% DAL
P2 16:47 Cross checking on the Devils (Brenden Dillon): 2 minutes on the power play +3% DAL
P2 10:41 Hooking on the Stars (Miro Heiskanen): 2 minutes on the power play +3% NJD
P2 3:12 Slashing on the Stars (Jason Robertson): 2 minutes on the power play +5% NJD
P3 8:54 Slashing on the Devils (Dougie Hamilton): 2 minutes on the power play +2% DAL

When it happened

Stars’ 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 Stars were ahead in it, below while the Devils were.
#WhenWhat happenedWin probability forNext drive
1 P1 15:48 Jack Hughes scored on a snap shot from 8 feetShooting · 11% chance +15% NJD –
2 P1 11:44 Wyatt Johnston scored on a snap shot from 23 feetShooting · 19% chance +14% DAL –
3 P1 10:49 Jesper Bratt scored on a wrist shot from 2 feetShooting · 40% chance +10% NJD –
4 P1 7:08 Connor Brown scored on a snap shot from 15 feetShooting · 9% chance +14% NJD –
5 P2 18:49 Wyatt Johnston scored on a snap shot from 8 feetShooting · 18% chance +8% DAL –
6 P2 7:29 Jason Robertson scored on a snap shot from 10 feetShooting · 8% chance +15% DAL –
7 P3 13:14 Timo Meier scored on a snap shot from 16 feetShooting · 6% chance +14% NJD –
8 P3 6:52 Mavrik Bourque scored on a tip from 8 feetShooting · 9% chance +11% 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

Devils 89% · Stars 11%

Final margin
Devils by 2
Luck in goals
0.1 for the Stars
Luck-adjusted margin
Devils by 2.1
Replay with same day's form
Devils 63% · Stars 37% 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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