xJawn NHL expected goals

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WPG @ STL

Winnipeg Jets at St. Louis Blues

Puck drop 8:00 PM ET · 2026-10-20
2026-27 · regular season
The call
STL 59.9%
Poisson matchup engine · issued before puck drop, never re-graded
expected goals
2.57–3.15
Predicted xG share
WPG 45%55% STL
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The call

The engine makes STL a 59.9% favorite, expecting a 2.57–3.15 game — STL controls 55.1% of the predicted xG. Of WPG's 2.57 expected goals, 1.77 should come at 5v5 and 0.63 on the power play; STL projects 2.38 at 5v5 and 0.67 on the power play. The logistic challenger puts the home side at 61.5%, Elo at 58.5%.

Why STL 59.9%
win chance× expected goals
5v5 play +4.6 STL ×1.00 · WPG ×0.90
home ice +3.6 STL ×1.08 · WPG ×1.00
finishing +2.0 STL ×1.05 · WPG ×1.01
goaltending −0.6 STL ×0.97 · WPG ×0.98
special teams −0.1 STL ×0.99 · WPG ×0.99
schedule +0.0 STL ×1.00 · WPG ×1.00

Win chance is in points toward STL (bars right of the line push toward STL, left toward WPG). Each win-chance number is one-at-a-time: that piece reset to league average (neutral ice, a typical night's rest) on both sides and the game re-priced; the pieces interact, so they don't add up to the call. The multipliers are exact: a league-average team on neutral ice, on a typical night's rest, would expect 2.88 goals in this game, and each side's expected goals is that times its column of multipliers. Special teams reads small because the engine's power-play terms fit near zero, not because special teams don't matter.

Open this matchup in the lab → to swap sides or adjust each team's rest situation.

Score outcomes

The same Poisson engine, read as a full score distribution instead of a single number: likeliest finals, how often the game needs more than regulation, and each team's goal spread — ■ WPG · ■ STL.

Past regulation
23.7%
6+ total goals
52.4%
WPG goals · 80% range
1–5
STL goals · 80% range
1–6
Likeliest finals (WPG–STL)probability
2–2 7.6% tied after regulation — OT/SO decides
3–3 6.9% tied after regulation — OT/SO decides
2–4 4.7%
1–3 4.6%
2–3 3.8%
7.8%4.3%019.8%13.6%125.2%21.1%221.4%22.0%313.8%17.5%47.2%11.2%53.1%6.0%61.2%2.7%70.5%1.6%8+

Scoreline odds are the engine's own grid: each team's goals as a Poisson count, with the fitted adjustment for how often games end tied after regulation (ρ = 0.35), so these odds and the headline win probability come from the same numbers. The OT/SO layer is a separate fitted model and is already inside the headline win probability.

Tale of the tape

How each team fares on its own, season to date: per-game xG rates with league rank (of 32). Rank 1 is best on every row — orange ranks sit in the top third of the league, gray in the bottom third.

WPGSTL
2.73 (20th) Offense
xG for / game
2.96 (14th)
3.01 (19th) Defense
xG against / game
2.68 (13th)
0.63 (24th) Power play
PP xG / game
0.68 (21st)
0.66 (11th) Penalty kill
PP xG conceded / game
0.67 (12th)

Where the goals should come from

WPG attacks the left net, STL the right. Each end multiplies where the attacking team generates xG this season by where its opponent concedes it (both vs league), scaled so each end totals the engine's expected goals — both ends share one colour axis, so the favorite's end reads hotter. vs league average recolours the map as % above/below a league-average matchup; Special teams pairs each side's power play with the other's penalty kill. Season-to-date shot locations, empty-netters excluded.

win probexp. goals 5v5special teams
WPG 40.1% 2.57 1.77 0.63
STL 59.9% 3.15 2.38 0.67

5v5 / special-teams portions come from the map's strength splits (one shared scale per team pins the all-strengths total to its expected goals), so they don't sum exactly — the remainder is 4v4, 3v3, and other mixed states.