luckadjusted
NHL Week 6 · 2026-27

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.

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. 1 NYI 5 NSH 2
  2. 2 NYI 4 NSH 1
  3. 3 NYI 4 NSH 2
  4. 4 NYI 3 NSH 2
  5. 5 NYI 3 NSH 4
  6. 6 NYI 3 NSH 4
  7. 7 NYI 4 NSH 6
  8. 8 NYI 3 NSH 6
  9. 9 NYI 6 NSH 9
  10. 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
OutcomeChance
Islanders win48.1%
Predators win51.9%
Middle 50%: Islanders by 2 to Predators by 250%
Middle 90%: Islanders by 4 to Predators by 490%
Middle 95%: Islanders by 4 to Predators by 595%
Exactly Predators by 121.2%
Exactly Islanders by 120.0%
Exactly Predators by 312.3%
Exactly Islanders by 310.9%
Exactly Predators by 29.9%

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.

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

Islanders win 44% of them, Predators 56%. The line is what actually happened: Islanders by 1.

Show as a table
Final margin in the replaysShare of replays
Islanders by 3+17.7%
Islanders by 28.7%
Islanders by 117.8%
Predators by 120.5%
Predators by 210.7%
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.

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 +1.3 goals to the Islanders: the final margin was Islanders by 1, without the luck Predators by 0.3. Luck shares are the fitted ones (how much of each kind is luck).
ShootingUnblocked attemptsGoalsExpected goalsAbove expected
Islanders4333.09−0.09
Predators3833.50−0.50

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.

WhenCallWin 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.

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 Predators were ahead in it, below while the Islanders were.
#WhenWhat happenedWin probability forNext 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
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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