Is this the year the Leafs get over their first-round hump?

It's been almost two decades since the Toronto Maple Leafs won a playoff series but expectations are high ahead of the team's first-round rematch with the Tampa Bay Lightning, who edged a seven-game thriller last season. Is this version of the Leafs different enough from the iterations that have failed at the first hurdle to finally make it to the second round of the Stanley Cup Playoffs?

Video Transcript

JULIAN MCKENZIE: Will Toronto win a round this year? Yes or no?

ARUN SRINIVASAN: Yes.

OMAR: Can I pass on this one?

SAM CHANG: Yes.

ARUN SRINIVASAN: I'll take-- I'll say this.

JULIAN MCKENZIE: No, you can't pass all this one, Omar. You better not pass on this one.

ARUN SRINIVASAN: Omar, I'll take a bullet for both of us if you want me to, man. Don't worry.

No, look. This team-- this is no, obviously, shade towards the Tampa Bay Lightning, who are the class of the Eastern Conference until proven otherwise. I just think that the Leafs' forwards are marginally better. Their defense is marginally better.

Andrei Vasilevskiy is the difference for Tampa Bay. He has been such an unbelievable presence that-- even this is being a down year for him, and he's the seventh-best goaltender in the NHL is just crazy to me. But I do think that the Leafs have figured out some of the bottom six issues they had before. Their defense has been as good as it's been in the Auston Matthews/Mitch Marner era.

And I think also, too, this idea of the ghosts of yesteryear lingering on the team-- I think you don't get that sense being around the team. Even when they-- I think two years ago I wasn't around the team with access two years ago. But having access to the team this year, it's like they don't really get bothered about losses, which I think is a good quality. They sort of shake it off and have an awesome next one mentality.

You see other teams really get down when they lose, but I've seen the Leafs like-- they got their ass kicked by the Bruins in January. And they were kind of like, OK, we have some things to figure it out. That sucks. And then they keep it moving. And I think that's a good quality to have, I think.

They added the requisite veterans and toughness that they think they needed. They're still play a really highly-skilled game. It's Tampa. I mean, look. Tampa can beat any team in the league on any given day. Nikita Kucherov is having one of the quietest Hart Trophy down-ballot seasons I've even seen him play.

JULIAN MCKENZIE: The quietest 100-point-plus season--

ARUN SRINIVASAN: That I've ever seen in my life.

JULIAN MCKENZIE: --maybe ever.

ARUN SRINIVASAN: Brayden Point might hit 50 goals if he plays tonight. So it's just like, yeah, they still have star power. But fatigue does matter. The closest parable I can think with this Tampa team is the 1983 Islanders that just ran out of gas. And that adds up.

Tampa is not going to be shook by anyone. But this Leafs team, they've sort of-- they've matured quite a bit. They, admittedly, have not had deep, long playoff runs that have taken a toll on their bodies. And I think that will matter a little bit.

So I have the Leafs beating the Lightning. And I'm happy to look like a fool if it doesn't work out that way.

JULIAN MCKENZIE: Man. Since Omar is not ready yet, I will say the Leafs will not win a round, only because you mention all those reasons with Tampa Bay. Until proven otherwise, I have to give them the benefit of the doubt, that the Lightning will figure their ish out. Just for whatever reason, over these last few weeks, whether it's just the players or John Cooper, something seems to be going on over there. I feel as if they could still figure it out in a playoff series, even if it gets against the Leafs or whoever.

There's just something about this team that has endured as much as they've endured over the last few years. To play through all these playoff runs, they know a thing or two. And it is possible that they could get fatigue from all of that, too. That's a lot of hockey to play over the last two, three, four years.

But there's something about how this team finds a way to get up and fight for these games when it really matters. I thought there would have been fatigue last year. It was not the case. Maybe at the end, but they still found a way to almost bring it to the absolute brink anyway.

I will be happy to be proven wrong in this situation, though, because I really think, for the Leafs, this can't go on forever. They can't have these teams build them up the right-- at least as good of a ways as it can, get all these other pieces that should fill out in terms of depth, and not have some measure of success. Not to mention, the Lightning, if they win the series-- OK, another year they win the first round-- their legacy is already secured as one of the best teams of the salary cap era. The Leafs need this even more.

ARUN SRINIVASAN: [INAUDIBLE] without a qualifier, one of the best teams ever regardless of [? error. ?]

JULIAN MCKENZIE: Yeah, the Leafs should be the most desperate team in that series. Because if they don't win that first round series, there's the potential for so much to change going forward and a lot of people's futures on the line.

So if I'm wrong, I have no problem being like, hey, guys, I'm wrong. The Leafs jokes are over. But the Leafs, they better get their ish together. And until then, I don't think they're winning a round.

ARUN SRINIVASAN: Yeah, more than fair. It's the Tampa Bay Lightning.

JULIAN MCKENZIE: They have not earned the benefit of the doubt.

ARUN SRINIVASAN: [LAUGHS]

JULIAN MCKENZIE: And I think that's more than fair.

ARUN SRINIVASAN: Yeah, that's more than fair, given that [INAUDIBLE].

JULIAN MCKENZIE: OK, Omar, you got to give us something, buddy.

OMAR: And that, Julian, right there-- what you said at the end is what scares me, is because for Tampa, if they win, cool. We extended our cool era. But the Leafs have to win.

ARUN SRINIVASAN: They have to.

JULIAN MCKENZIE: They have to win it.

OMAR: And that is what scares me, because they have to win. Not that it would be cool-- they have to win. And ever since Montreal, the focus has been on killer instinct. And that's why, when everyone was saying, oh, the Leafs, they-- they went too hard and they destroyed Montreal 7-1-- no, I want that to happen. I didn't give a single damn. I was hoping they'd score 10 because they need to find that I don't give an F, we're going to win this game.

And there hasn't been a moment in this Matthews era where I've seen either a player, a line, whatever, just decide we are not losing this fricking game. Last year, I saw some signs of it. Again, game one gaslit me. I was in shock. Saw David Kampf score a breakaway goal on Vasilevskiy. I'm-- what the frig is going on? Jake Muzzin from the point-- the heck's going on? Matthews scores. Then he scores again. What the heck's going on? Frigging Kyle Clifford took his stick and bonked Corey Perry in the head. I'm like, OK, right?

JULIAN MCKENZIE: How's Kyle Clifford doing?

OMAR: I don't know. I think he's [INAUDIBLE]. [LAUGHS] But as the season went on, or as the series went on, there were good moments definitely. But I didn't see that moment of we're not losing this game. And that's why, for many Leafs fans, if the Leafs are up 3-2 in this series and they have a chance to win game six and they don't, if you test the temperature on Leafs Twitter, it will be sub zero negative because we know.

So yes, the poetic narrative would be cool, it would be awesome if they went back home and they finished in the seven. I don't want that. If they win the series, I want it to be in six. Straight up.

JULIAN MCKENZIE: You don't want a game seven on home ice?

OMAR: No! No, I do not because as cool--

JULIAN MCKENZIE: Gee, I wonder why you wouldn't want game seven on home ice.

OMAR: Oh, you know, because it's worked so well the last, I don't know, however many years because we've won so many game sevens.

JULIAN MCKENZIE: I mean, in all fairness, game seven on the road didn't work all that much either.

OMAR: Fair. [LAUGHS] But--

JULIAN MCKENZIE: No disrespect.

OMAR: Yeah. No, it's just--

JULIAN MCKENZIE: It's just like, pick your poison. Just win game seven.

ARUN SRINIVASAN: Just win.

JULIAN MCKENZIE: If it gets [? true. ?]

OMAR: It's true. And it's Vasilevskiy, man.

ARUN SRINIVASAN: Vasilevskiy.

OMAR: And those elimination games, he just fricking transforms into a brick wall and just says, you're not scoring on me. I'll give you one. You're not getting two. And I don't want to do-- I don't want to play the officiating game and be like, oh, well, if is this official or if it's that official, or if this happens, if this happens. They just need to do it.

JULIAN MCKENZIE: You don't have to play those games. But Omar, you have to tell us if Toronto will win a round this year or not.

OMAR: [SIGHS]

JULIAN MCKENZIE: You have to say yes or no. Sam has already said yes. Arun has said yes. I said no. Make the decision.

OMAR: Yes. Yes.

JULIAN MCKENZIE: OK.

OMAR: I think.

JULIAN MCKENZIE: So three of us believe.