luckadjusted
NHL Week 1 · 2026-27

First round 2025-26 · April 21, 2026

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

Bruins at Sabres, Game 2, first round 2025-26: who deserved to win?

The Bruins beat the Sabres 4–2, but the replays call it close to a coin flip: with the way both teams played, the Bruins win 5 of 10. Luck ran their way: shooting alone was worth 25 points of win probability to the Bruins.

The biggest swing (P2, 15:06 left): Viktor Arvidsson scored on a backhand shot from 20 feet, worth 19 points of win probability to the Bruins.

Final

Boston Bruins 4
Buffalo Sabres 2

April 21, 2026 · KeyBank Center

Luck index +51 Bruins lucky · −51 Sabres

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. Bruins win 5, Sabres win 5.

  1. 1 BOS 5 BUF 2
  2. 2 BOS 3 BUF 0
  3. 3 BOS 5 BUF 3
  4. 4 BOS 4 BUF 3
  5. 5 BOS 4 BUF 3
  6. 6 BOS 3 BUF 4
  7. 7 BOS 3 BUF 4
  8. 8 BOS 3 BUF 5
  9. 9 BOS 5 BUF 8
  10. 10 BOS 0 BUF 4

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 4,000.1 replays ended

Bruins win 49% of them, Sabres 51%. The line is what actually happened: Bruins by 2.

Show as a table
Final margin in the replaysShare of replays
Bruins by 3+17.1%
Bruins by 29.5%
Bruins by 122.3%
Sabres by 119.6%
Sabres by 210.4%
Sabres by 3+21.1%

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 +0.7 goals to the Bruins: the final margin was Bruins by 2, without the luck Bruins by 1.3. Luck shares are the fitted ones (how much of each kind is luck).
ShootingUnblocked attemptsGoalsExpected goalsAbove expected
Bruins4142.99+1.01
Sabres5523.88−1.88

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 15:50 Roughing on the Bruins (Nikita Zadorov): 2 minutes on the power play +4% BUF
P1 11:17 Hooking on the Sabres (Josh Doan): 2 minutes on the power play +4% BOS
P1 9:20 Cross checking on the Sabres (Conor Timmins): 2 minutes on the power play +4% BOS
P1 0:31 Tripping on the Bruins (David Pastrnak): 2 minutes on the power play +4% BUF
P2 12:22 Delaying game puck over glass on the Sabres (Bowen Byram): 2 minutes on the power play +4% BOS
P2 10:01 Interference on the Bruins (Tanner Jeannot): 2 minutes on the power play +4% BUF
P2 2:05 Interference on the Sabres (Tage Thompson): 2 minutes on the power play +3% BOS
P3 17:34 Tripping on the Bruins (Charlie McAvoy): 2 minutes on the power play 0% BUF
P3 10:43 Cross checking on the Sabres (Peyton Krebs): 2 minutes on the power play 0% BOS
P3 8:40 Hooking on the Bruins (James Hagens): 2 minutes on the power play 0% BUF

When it happened

Sabres’ 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 Sabres were ahead in it, below while the Bruins were.
#WhenWhat happenedWin probability forNext drive
1 P1 9:20 Cross checking on the Sabres (Conor Timmins): 2 minutes on the power playPenalty calls +4% BOS –
2 P1 0:31 Tripping on the Bruins (David Pastrnak): 2 minutes on the power playPenalty calls +4% BUF –
3 P2 16:51 Marat Khusnutdinov missed the net with a wrist shot from 6 feetShooting · 22% chance +4% BUF –
4 P2 15:06 Viktor Arvidsson scored on a backhand shot from 20 feetShooting · 7% chance +19% BOS –
5 P2 12:22 Delaying game puck over glass on the Sabres (Bowen Byram): 2 minutes on the power playPenalty calls +4% BOS –
6 P2 10:01 Interference on the Bruins (Tanner Jeannot): 2 minutes on the power playPenalty calls +4% BUF –
7 P2 3:31 Morgan Geekie scored on a backhand shot from 89 feetShooting · 1% chance +16% BOS –
8 P2 1:50 Pavel Zacha scored on a tip from 21 feetShooting · 10% chance +7% BOS –

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

Bruins 73% · Sabres 27%

Final margin
Bruins by 2
Luck in goals
0.7 for the Bruins
Luck-adjusted margin
Bruins by 1.3
Replay with same day's form
Bruins 49% · Sabres 51% 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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