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.

Wild at Lightning, Mar 24, 2026: who deserved to win?

The Lightning beat the Wild 6–3, and the replays lean their way: with the same day's form, they win 6 of 10.

The biggest swing (P3, 2:53 left): Erik Cernak scored on a snap shot from 6 feet, worth 30 points of win probability to the Lightning.

Final

Minnesota Wild 3
Tampa Bay Lightning 6

March 24, 2026 · Benchmark International Arena

Luck index +37 Lightning lucky · −37 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 4, Lightning win 6.

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

Wild win 37% of them, Lightning 63%. The line is what actually happened: Lightning by 3.

Show as a table
Final margin in the replaysShare of replays
Wild by 3+9.9%
Wild by 27.4%
Wild by 120.2%
Lightning by 121.2%
Lightning by 211.7%
Lightning by 3+29.7%

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 Lightning: the final margin was Lightning by 3, without the luck Lightning by 2.6. Luck shares are the fitted ones (how much of each kind is luck).
ShootingUnblocked attemptsGoalsExpected goalsAbove expected
Wild3832.19+0.81
Lightning4743.23+0.77

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 18:00 Hooking on the Lightning (Anthony Cirelli): 2 minutes on the power play +4% MIN
P1 14:52 Holding on the Wild (Brock Faber): 2 minutes on the power play +4% TBL
P1 1:25 Abuse of officials on the Lightning (Brandon Hagel): 2 minutes on the power play +4% MIN
P2 14:50 Slashing on the Wild (Jonas Brodin): 2 minutes on the power play +3% TBL
P2 13:11 Cross checking on the Lightning (Gage Goncalves): 2 minutes on the power play +4% MIN
P2 12:50 Tripping on the Lightning (Erik Cernak): 2 minutes on the power play +4% MIN
P2 4:56 Holding on the Wild (Marcus Johansson): 2 minutes on the power play +5% TBL
P2 1:18 A Wild goal came off the board on review (goal interference) +25% TBL
P3 2:22 Cross checking on the Wild (Ryan Hartman): 2 minutes on the power play +6% TBL

When it happened

Lightning’ chance of winning

As low as 15% 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 Lightning were ahead in it, below while the Wild were.
#WhenWhat happenedWin probability forNext drive
1 P1 17:32 Mats Zuccarello scored on a wrist shot from 23 feetShooting · 8% chance +15% MIN –
2 P1 1:11 Brock Faber scored on a wrist shot from 57 feetShooting · 2% chance +15% MIN –
3 P2 14:15 Brayden Point scored on a snap shot from 20 feetShooting · 27% chance +12% TBL –
4 P2 10:09 Vladimir Tarasenko scored on a wrist shot from 32 feetShooting · 6% chance +15% MIN –
5 P2 7:33 Jake Guentzel scored on a snap shot from 13 feetShooting · 18% chance +14% TBL –
6 P2 4:41 Darren Raddysh scored on a slap shot from 37 feetShooting · 10% chance +21% TBL –
7 P2 1:18 A Wild goal came off the board on review (goal interference)Overturned goals +25% TBL –
8 P3 2:53 Erik Cernak scored on a snap shot from 6 feetShooting · 26% chance +30% TBL –

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 7% · Lightning 93%

Final margin
Lightning by 3
Luck in goals
0.4 for the Lightning
Luck-adjusted margin
Lightning by 2.6
Replay with same day's form
Wild 37% · Lightning 63% 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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