2026-27 regular season · October 27, 2026 · SO
No betting line for this game, so there is no before-puck-drop or fresh-game number.
Islanders at Predators, Oct 27, 2026: who deserved to win?
The Islanders beat the Predators 4–3, but the replays call it close to a coin flip: with the way both teams played, the Islanders win 4 of 10. Luck ran their way: shootout alone was worth 50 points of win probability to the Islanders.
The game turned on a luck play (SO): the Islanders won the shootout, worth 50 points of win probability to the Islanders.
Final (SO)
| 4 | |
| 3 |
Replay with same day's form
Luck index +56 Islanders lucky · −56 Predators
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. Islanders win 4, Predators win 6.
- 1 NYI 5 NSH 2
- 2 NYI 4 NSH 1
- 3 NYI 4 NSH 2
- 4 NYI 3 NSH 2
- 5 NYI 3 NSH 4
- 6 NYI 3 NSH 4
- 7 NYI 4 NSH 6
- 8 NYI 3 NSH 6
- 9 NYI 6 NSH 9
- 10 NYI 3 NSH 8
Our prediction before puck drop
We had the Predators by 0.1, 52% to win. The Islanders won by 1, a result we gave 48%. The final margin was 1.1 goals from ours; 59% of games like this end further from the forecast than that.
Show as a table
| Outcome | Chance |
|---|---|
| Islanders win | 48.1% |
| Predators win | 51.9% |
| Middle 50%: Islanders by 2 to Predators by 2 | 50% |
| Middle 90%: Islanders by 4 to Predators by 4 | 90% |
| Middle 95%: Islanders by 4 to Predators by 5 | 95% |
| Exactly Predators by 1 | 21.2% |
| Exactly Islanders by 1 | 20.0% |
| Exactly Predators by 3 | 12.3% |
| Exactly Islanders by 3 | 10.9% |
| Exactly Predators by 2 | 9.9% |
Most of the distance between a forecast and a final score is luck: a hot goalie, a post or a deflection moves a hockey score more than anything known before the game. Made Tue, Oct 27, 12:07 pm ET and frozen at puck drop. How our predictions have done
Three other ways to ask
Each answers a different question, so none of them replaces the replay above.
Before puck drop
No closing line for this game.
Same teams, fresh game
Needs the closing line, which this game has not got.
Only coin-flips re-rolled
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
Islanders win 44% of them, Predators 56%. The line is what actually happened: Islanders by 1.
Show as a table
| Final margin in the replays | Share of replays |
|---|---|
| Islanders by 3+ | 17.7% |
| Islanders by 2 | 8.7% |
| Islanders by 1 | 17.8% |
| Predators by 1 | 20.5% |
| Predators by 2 | 10.7% |
| Predators by 3+ | 24.5% |
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.
| Shooting | Unblocked attempts | Goals | Expected goals | Above expected |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 43 | 3 | 3.09 | −0.09 | |
| 38 | 3 | 3.50 | −0.50 |
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.
| When | Call | Win probability for |
|---|---|---|
| P1 18:44 | High sticking on the Islanders (Matthew Kessel): 2 minutes on the power play | +4% NSH |
| P1 18:13 | Interference on the Predators (Roman Josi): 2 minutes on the power play | +4% NYI |
| P1 11:04 | Too many men on the ice on the Predators (NSH): 2 minutes on the power play | +3% NYI |
| P1 9:29 | Interference on the Islanders (Anthony Duclair): 2 minutes on the power play | +3% NSH |
| P1 6:53 | Slashing on the Predators (Matthew Wood): 2 minutes on the power play | +3% NYI |
| P1 4:28 | Interference on the Islanders (Ondrej Palat): 2 minutes on the power play | +3% NSH |
| P2 10:32 | Hooking on the Islanders (Brayden Schenn): 2 minutes on the power play | +2% NSH |
| P3 18:05 | Tripping on the Predators (Ryan O'Reilly): 2 minutes on the power play | +5% NYI |
| P3 9:16 | Interference on the Islanders (Matthew Kessel): 2 minutes on the power play | +8% NSH |
| OT 2:43 | Tripping on the Predators (Filip Forsberg): 2 minutes on the power play | +12% NYI |
When it happened
Predators’ chance of winning
As low as 0% and as high as 54%. Numbers mark the biggest luck moments, listed below.
| # | When | What happened | Win probability for | Next drive |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | P1 16:53 | Anthony Duclair scored on a tip from 13 feetShooting · 9% chance | +15% NYI | – |
| 2 | P1 11:53 | Brayden Schenn scored on a backhand shot from 5 feetShooting · 12% chance | +13% NYI | – |
| 3 | P2 18:52 | Bo Horvat scored on a snap shot from 23 feetShooting · 13% chance | +9% NYI | – |
| 4 | P2 10:18 | Filip Forsberg scored on a wrist shot from 11 feetShooting · 13% chance | +8% NSH | – |
| 5 | P2 6:58 | Alexander Kerfoot scored on a wrist shot from 4 feetShooting · 27% chance | +12% NSH | – |
| 6 | P3 15:44 | Ryan O'Reilly scored on a backhand shot from 2 feetShooting · 34% chance | +19% NSH | – |
| 7 | SO | The game turned hereThe Islanders won the shootoutShootout · shootouts are close to coin flips | +49% NYI | – |
| 8 | OT 2:43 | Tripping on the Predators (Filip Forsberg): 2 minutes on the power playPenalty calls | +12% NYI | – |
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
Islanders 43% · Predators 57%
- Final margin
- Islanders by 1
- Luck in goals
- 1.3 for the Islanders
- Luck-adjusted margin
- Predators by 0.3
- Replay with same day's form
- Islanders 44% · Predators 56% unchanged: why
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.
More from week 5, 2026-27
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