luckadjusted
NHL Week 1 · 2026-27

Stanley Cup Final 2025-26 · June 7, 2026 · OT

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

Hurricanes at Golden Knights, Game 3, Stanley Cup Final 2025-26: who deserved to win?

The Golden Knights beat the Hurricanes 5–4, but the replays call it close to a coin flip: with the way both teams played, the Golden Knights win 5 of 10. Luck ran their way: overtime alone was worth 49 points of win probability to the Golden Knights.

The biggest swing (OT): the Golden Knights won in overtime, worth 49 points of win probability to the Golden Knights.

Final (OT)

Carolina Hurricanes 4
Vegas Golden Knights 5

June 7, 2026 · T-Mobile Arena

Luck index +49 Golden Knights lucky · −49 Hurricanes

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 5, Golden Knights win 5.

  1. 1 CAR 5 VGK 1
  2. 2 CAR 7 VGK 4
  3. 3 CAR 4 VGK 2
  4. 4 CAR 4 VGK 3
  5. 5 CAR 3 VGK 2
  6. 6 CAR 4 VGK 5
  7. 7 CAR 6 VGK 7
  8. 8 CAR 2 VGK 4
  9. 9 CAR 1 VGK 4
  10. 10 CAR 0 VGK 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 3,999.9 replays ended

Hurricanes win 49% of them, Golden Knights 51%. The line is what actually happened: Golden Knights by 1.

Show as a table
Final margin in the replaysShare of replays
Hurricanes by 3+19.3%
Hurricanes by 210.3%
Hurricanes by 119.4%
Golden Knights by 122.0%
Golden Knights by 29.2%
Golden Knights by 3+19.7%

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 +1.2 goals to the Golden Knights: the final margin was Golden Knights by 1, without the luck Hurricanes by 0.2. Luck shares are the fitted ones (how much of each kind is luck).
ShootingUnblocked attemptsGoalsExpected goalsAbove expected
Hurricanes4343.08+0.92
Golden Knights4442.78+1.22

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
P2 19:26 A Golden Knights goal came off the board on review (off side) +19% CAR
P2 16:00 A Golden Knights goal came off the board on review (goal interference) +20% CAR
P2 9:44 Too many men on the ice on the Hurricanes (CAR): 2 minutes on the power play +5% VGK
P3 16:45 Holding the stick on the Golden Knights (Cole Smith): 2 minutes on the power play 0% CAR
P3 7:53 Delaying game puck over glass on the Hurricanes (Seth Jarvis): 2 minutes on the power play +5% VGK
P3 2:55 Delaying game puck over glass on the Golden Knights (Shea Theodore): 2 minutes on the power play +6% CAR

When it happened

Golden Knights’ chance of winning

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 Golden Knights were ahead in it, below while the Hurricanes were.
#WhenWhat happenedWin probability forNext drive
1 P2 19:26 A Golden Knights goal came off the board on review (off side)Overturned goals +19% CAR –
2 P2 16:00 A Golden Knights goal came off the board on review (goal interference)Overturned goals +20% CAR –
3 P2 9:34 Tomas Hertl scored on a wrist shot from 11 feetShooting · 16% chance +18% VGK –
4 P2 9:18 Mitch Marner scored on a backhand shot from 34 feetShooting · 2% chance +14% VGK –
5 P3 12:18 Jordan Staal scored on a tip from 19 feetShooting · 4% chance +13% CAR –
6 P3 1:46 Jordan Staal’s wrist shot from 5 feet was savedShooting · 23% chanceAndrei Svechnikov’s wrist shot from 7 feet was savedShooting · 23% chance +20% VGK –
7 P3 1:42 Andrei Svechnikov scored on a wrist shot from 5 feetShooting · 27% chance +31% CAR –
8 OT The Golden Knights won in overtimeOvertime · overtime is close to a coin flip +49% VGK –

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 55% · Golden Knights 45%

Final margin
Golden Knights by 1
Luck in goals
1.2 for the Golden Knights
Luck-adjusted margin
Hurricanes by 0.2
Replay with same day's form
Hurricanes 49% · Golden Knights 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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