Toronto Maple Leafs vs. Tampa Bay Lightning: Who Has the Advantage?

For the second consecutive season, the Toronto Maple Leafs will face-off against the Tampa Bay Lightning in the First Round.

There is nothing about this playoff series that the Toronto Maple Leafs should be afraid of. It’s essentially a rinse and repeat of last year and that defeat should only motivate them more, to win this year.

When the Leafs faced the Lightning last year, it was new territory. First, they hadn’t seen the Lightning in the playoffs before and secondly, they had home-ice advantage for the first time in the Auston Matthews Era.

I know they had it during the Montreal Canadiens series but there were no fans in the building, so home-ice advantage doesn’t really mean much when there’s no crowd.

Both team’s cores are the basically the same. The only difference is that Ondrej Palat is no longer on the Lightning’s roster. However, their forwards are still stacked and the team is primed to make another long playoff push.

So, who’s going to win?

Will Toronto finally break their streak and win their first playoff series in 19 years, or will the Lightning do what they do every spring and defeat every opponent they face?

Well, let’s compare both team’s based on their forwards, defenseman, goaltender and the veterans on each roster and see who’s better.

Let’s start with the forwards:

Toronto Maple Leafs vs Tampa Bay Lightning

No. 1: Forwards

Toronto Maple Leafs: 

• Mitch Marner: 30 goals, 99 points
• William Nylander: 40 goals, 87 points
• Auston Matthews: 40 goals, 85 points
• John Tavares: 36 goals, 80 points

Tampa Bay Lightning: 

• Nikita Kucherov: 30 goals, 113 points
• Brayden Point: 51 goals, 95 points
• Steven Stamkos: 34 goals, 84 points
• Brandon Hagel: 30 goals, 64 points

The Lightning have an 113 point-man in Kucherov, a 51 goal scorer in Point, followed by two other 30-goal scorers. As for the Leafs, Marner led the way with 99 points, Nylander and Matthews both scored 40 goals and Tavares was almost a point-per-game player with 80 points.

You’d think that the Lightning may have an advantage with Point and Kucherov but if you look at both four-packs, it’s crazy how close it is. Toronto’s four generated 146 goals and 351 points, while the Lightning’s top-four had 145 goals and 356 points this year.

So, who really has the advantage here?

I think there’s more consistency with Toronto’s top-six, while Matthews is clearly the x-factor. Based on his regular season numbers, he clearly underperformed this year but he’s getting hot at the right time. If Matthews is the best player in this series, the Leafs will be hard to stop.

Advantage: Toronto Maple Leafs

No. 3: Defenseman

Toronto Maple Leafs:

• Timothy Liljegren, Morgan Rielly, Jake McCabe, Justin Holl, TJ Brodie, Luke Schenn, Erik Gustafsson, Mark Giordano

Tampa Bay Lightning: 

• Victor Hedman, Mikhail Sergachev, Darren Raddysh, Ian Cole, Nicklaud Perbix, Haydn Fleury, Zach Bogosian

The Lightning clearly have the best defenseman in the series with Hedman, but after that, it gets a lot closer than you’d think.

Tampa Bay also has the best offensive defenseman in Sergachev but overall team defense is more important than one defenseman generating offense. So which team is better defensively?

Toronto only allowed 2.68 goals per game this year, which was seventh in the NHL, while the Lightning ranked 15th in the league, allowing 3.07 goals per game. Toronto also had the edge in terms of their penalty kill, finishing 13th, while the Lightning finished 16th.

As previously mentioned, Tampa Bay may have the best defenseman but overall, I’d still give the advantage to Toronto’s defensive-group. The addition of McCabe, Schenn and Gustafsson really solidified their roster and gave them serious depth, so as a team, I think their defense is better than Tampa Bay’s.

Advantage: Toronto Maple Leafs

No. 4: Goaltending

Toronto Maple Leafs:

• Ilya Samsonov, Joseph Woll

Tampa Bay Lightning:

• Andrei Vasilevskiy

Vasilevskiy is a former Conn Smythe Trophy and Vezina Trophy winner and has two Stanley Cup ring’s. Not only that, but he’s played in over 100 playoff games.

It’s crazy, but Vasilevskiy almost has as many playoff starts as Samsonov and Woll have combined regular season experience, so with that being said, there shouldn’t be much of a debate as to who has the advantage, right?

However, let’s do it anyways.

Samsonov finished the season with better stats (2.33 GAA, 0.919 SV%) than Vasilevskiy (.915 SV%, 2.65 GAA) this season. Not only was Samsonov better statistically, but we can’t forget about Woll, who was also better (2.16 GAA and .932 SV%).

Woll only appeared in seven games, so his sample-size is much smaller but is it possible that Toronto actually has the advantage in net? I mean, if Vasilevskiy gets injured, the Lightning have to turn to Brian Elliot, so they’re screwed. However, if Samsonov gets hurt, I feel way more confident in Woll getting the job done, then someone like Elliot.

As much as the Leafs fan in me would love to give Toronto the advantage here, I can’t. Vasilevskiy is arguably the best goaltender on the planet still, so if he plays to his highest capabilities, the Leafs will have a hard time beating the Lightning this year.

Advantage: Tampa Bay Lightning