Democrats have shockingly won majority hold on the House of Representatives in the 2018 midterms, knocking out Republicans after six years, as first reported by NBC News.

It was clear going into election day that this was the favorited outcome, though, as we all now know, that doesn’t actually mean much when it comes down to it. As Silver put it last night, “An 86 percent chance might seem like a sure thing, but it isn’t — would you board a plane that had a 14 percent chance of crashing?” Good point. Still, a six in seven chance (86%) was nothing to sneeze at. While we were all rightfully fretting that this was going to be another GOP win, there were a few factors to consider that probably would’ve made us all feel better.

Opposition parties almost always do well at the midterms! On average since World War II, the popular vote for the House goes 7.3 percentage points from the president’s party to the opposition in the midterms. This is one of the most certain regularities in American politics, as voters tend to strike a balance between Congress and the presidential administration. While that’s not always the case, as we know, a blue wave this year wasn’t out of the question. Regardless, after the results of the 2016 presidential race, people weren’t betting that Democrats would take the House.