Leafs-Panthers Series Preview.

 1A Toronto vs Florida 3A

We are back with another Playoff preview here on the ETEH Blog, so today we are looking at the the 1st of 2 2nd round Series that was locked in the Eastern Conference playoff picture, as we're going to be looking at the Atlantic’s second round series as the Panthers who are the defending cup champs and after finishing 3rd in the Atlantic took down the Bolts in a simple 5 games in round 1, take on the Toronto Maple Leafs who won their first ever Atlantic title this year and after going up 3 games were able to narrowly take down the Senators in 6 games 4-2 as they advance to round 2 for the 2nd time in 3 seasons.

History of Rivalry Between teams in playoffs:

Now for Florida and Toronto, they haven’t had a long playoff history as the Leafs and Panthers hasn’t played in the postseason until just 2 years ago as after finally winning a playoff round for the 1st time in 19 years the Leafs went to round 2 and played the underdog Panthers who had just came back and won in 7 against the league leading Bruins, and after taking a 3-0 series lead the Panthers would eventually take down the Leafs in 5 4-1 en route to their Cup Final loss to the Knights two years ago, so these two teams don’t have a abundance of history in the playoffs, but in the 1 playoff series they did play just 2 years ago in round 2, the Panthers came out on top, so the Leafs will look to draw even and finally get to the Conference Final, while Florida will look yo go to their 3rd straight Conference Final. 

Season Series Record: 

Toronto 1-3-0 15-7+8

Florida 3-1-0 7-15-8

Bob DeChiara Imagn Images

Each teams X-Factors: Lundell vs Stolarz 

Next we go over to the two teams X-Factors in my opinion for this series and the two X-Factors in my eyes are the Panthers 3rd line and especially the Center in Anton Lundell and Leafs starting goalie Anthony Stolarz, now for the Panthers toward the end of their series against the Bolts, the 3rd line of Lundell, Luostarinen and Marchand started to pick up the pace and started to make their presence known in the series and this line is going to need to be big for the Panthers, but especially Anton Lundell who Center’s that line and really does well contributing depth scoring so the Panthers will need him to be good for them to win the series, while for Toronto it has to be Anthony Stolarz who backed up in Florida last year and got his first taste of playoff action in round 1 and stood tall and did well for the Leafs against Ottawa in round 1, and if he can replicate those performances against Florida then I really do like the Leafs chances to take down Florida in round 2.

Which teams are best at 3 Positions:

Nick Turchiaro Imagn Images

Offense: now on the offensive side of the puck, it is a pretty interesting matchup between the Leafs and Panthers as both teams have ever so dangerous top 6’s who can score at will but also have pretty deep teams and so have solid bottom sixes who can contribute with some secondary scoring, but in this series with these two teams and how they stack up, I think I will give the edge to the Maple Leafs as Toronto has a solid forward group and I think have a bit more firepower and a tiny bit more depth then the Panthers do.

Defence: now defensively these teams both have big and bruising bluelines as the Panthers do really well with the 6 defenders they have and the Leafs defenders have actually looked quite good in the playoffs, but I feel that once Ekblad is back from his suspension the Panthers will definitely have the edge on the blueline as I feel that while it may not be as lethal as last years, it is still a scary defence and for sure better the the Leafs is.

Goaltending: and lastly in Net you have Stolarz for the Leafs and Bobrovsky for the Panthers who actually were a tandem last year en route to Florida’s Cup win, but Stolarz was Bobrovsky’s backup and with Bobrovsky still being a top 10 NHL goalie compared to Stolarz who had one good season, I am definitely taking Bobrovsky and the Panthers to have the advantage in Net although I do feel the margin is closer then many people think. 

Biggest on Ice Matchup: Panthers D vs Leafs core 4

Now in my opinion the biggest on ice matchup between these two teams in this series has to be the Panthers defensive core and how that will fair against the Leafs big 4 offensively, now for the longest time the Leafs core 4 was mentioned as not having enough killer instinct to take down opponents in the playoffs, but in round 1 they all showed up as Marner had a few assists, Matthews scored a few big goals and Nylander and Tavares both looked great and if you expand the core a bit, Knies was brilliant as well and they showed up when the Leafs needed it most in round 1, and on the other side when the Panthers won their cup last year a big part of it was the extremely talented blueline they had and how the shutdown opposing teams top talent like Kucherov, Pastrnak and to some extent McDavid, so in my eyes this is the biggest matchup in this series and the one I feel could tip it on way or another as if Florida’s defence is looking great again I feel they have a strong chance, but if the core 4 shows up again then maybe the Leafs could go to the Conference Final.

Predictions:

Now when it comes to my predictions for this 2nd round series, I am going to be predicting this series based off of some history between these two teams in the playoffs as only 2 years ago these two teams faced off in round 2 and the Panthers quite handedly beat them in 5 games en route to their first Cup Final appearance in some time, so even though I would like to see the Leafs win the series and have a new team in the Conference Final, i am going to predict that the Panthers take this series just like last time in 5 games, I feel that the Panthers just play such a shutdown style of game that the Leafs can’t really keep up with them, so while I wouldn’t be surprised if the Leafs pushed it to 6 and I would like to see the Leafs win, I am taking the Panthers to win and advance to their 3rd straight Conference Final.