Anthony Stolarz put it best.
Fresh off a shutout performance that clinched the Atlantic Division crown for Toronto and triggered the long-awaited return of the Battle of Ontario, the Maple Leafs netminder summed up the first-round bout to come aptly.
“It’s gonna be a bloodbath,” Stolarz said. “Gonna be a little bit of war. So, we’ll be ready.”
It’s been 21 years since the Maple Leafs and Ottawa Senators last crossed paths in the post-season. For a stretch two decades ago, it seemed a near-annual affair, the provincial rivals meeting four times between 2000–04, the likes of Tie Domi, Chris Neil, Mats Sundin and Daniel Alfredsson, ensuring it was always appointment viewing.
“I grew up watching this series,” said Maple Leafs forward — and Kitchener, Ont., native — Steven Lorentz once the matchup was set. “I just remember being a little kid, having a mini-stick net right in front of the TV. And when there was a TV timeout or something like that, I just started firing the ball into the net. Now, to be able to do this, I still feel like I’m that eight-year-old kid watching on TV — but I get to sit on the bench for the big boys and go put my effort in out there.”
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Since that last seven-game thriller in 2004, the two clubs have found themselves on different tracks. The Maple Leafs missed the post-season in 10 of 11 seasons following that series, while the Sens kept working their way up the ladder in the East, stitching together a Cup Final run in ’07. A decade later, in 2016-17, the organizations’ fortunes flipped. The Erik Karlsson-led Sens came within one win of the Stanley Cup Final, before falling into a playoff drought that’s endured for seven years — the Leafs, meanwhile, made their return to the dance with a rookie Auston Matthews at the helm, and have been in the mix every year since.
Now, after a decades-long wait, the two teams’ paths are set to finally converge — Toronto, nearly a decade into the high-flying Matthews Era, still hunting for meaningful playoff success after a run of seven first-round exits in eight years; and Ottawa, young and hungry, licking their chops for a chance to finally make some playoff noise once again, and to knock off their well-paid, much-discussed provincial rival.
It’s a meeting fans in both towns have been craving for years — a fact that hasn’t escaped participants in both rooms ahead of Game 1.
“‘Exciting’ is probably downplaying it a little bit. I mean, it’s going to be great,” Ottawa head coach Travis Green said after the matchup was locked in Tuesday night. “It’s going to be an intense series. It’s going to be a lot of emotions, for both cities. Really, everything you want in a playoff series.”
“We’d be happy with anyone,” added Sens forward Drake Batherson. “But I feel like everyone wants the Battle of Ontario. So, they’re gonna get it.”
HEAD TO HEAD RECORD
Maple Leafs: 0-3-0
Senators: 3-0-0
THE BREAKDOWN
For how much the Maple Leafs faithful were clamouring for a shot at the Senators in Round 1 — more specifically, a shot at avoiding the familiar pain of a first-round bout with Florida or Tampa Bay — the task sitting in front of Toronto is far from a simple one.
Of the Panthers, Bolts and Senators, there’s only one club Toronto didn’t manage to register a single win against in 2024-25 — it was all Ottawa all year during the regular-season iteration of the Battle of Ontario, the Sens going 3-0 against the Leafs and outscoring them 9-3 in those meetings. If those tilts are any indication, the Maple Leafs figure to have their hands full against a young Senators side that managed to overwhelm them — either with an early stunner or a slow-and-steady comeback — every time they faced each other this season.
But it’s the context beyond those regular-season meetings that brings the real fireworks to this opening-round bout, the extra sauce that comes with the all-encompassing intensity of playoff hockey.
On one side, we have a Maple Leafs squad that’s seemed on a cliff’s edge for years now, the potential for significant organizational change hovering above Toronto’s star-studded core like a black cloud. We’re in Year 2 or 3 of wondering if another first-round exit means the end of this iteration of the Maple Leafs — that is, whether one of the club’s well-paid All-Stars will see his time in blue and white cut short. But, at the risk of falling into the trap that seems to be set annually for this organization, what if these Leafs are different?
There’s no question they’re a different club than the one that lost to Boston a year ago. The arrival of Craig Berube has fundamentally altered Toronto’s approach, instilling in the highlight-reel seekers a style that certainly seems better suited to the grind of the post-season. That it lifted Toronto to its first Atlantic Division title says something of the growth this group has found this season. Still, as has long been the case with this club, it’ll take undeniable post-season success to truly turn the doubters.
On the other side, we have a Senators team that seems to finally be reaching the culmination of a near-decade-long hunt for progress. From the arrival of Brady Tkachuk in 2018, to Tim Stutzle touching down in 2020, to the emergence of the rest of the club’s young core along the way, the Sens have been building. But it’s the past few years’ worth of experienced additions that have helped them finally get over the hill and back into the dance, Ottawa supplementing that young core with proven, elite veterans like Claude Giroux and Linus Ullmark.
The arrival of Green this season — and his revamping of the Sens’ defensive approach — has been another pivotal turning point, the new coach’s guidance leading Ottawa to the 90-point plateau for the first time since 2017, when they marched all the way to Conference Final.
Pressure-wise, it couldn’t have lined up better for Ottawa. The return to the post-season is progress enough — any playoff magic from here on out is a bonus for a squad that’s simply been craving forward motion. They enter Round 1 as an underdog simply looking to show their mettle, with an opponent standing across from them that’ll undoubtedly bring out their best.
Meanwhile, Toronto enters this next test draped in pressure — to live up to their division-winner status and dispense with a team they’re favoured to beat, to make good on the opportunity of facing a wild-card squad rather than a recent Cup champ, to find the post-season results they’ve been seeking for the past half-decade.
Which squad rises to meet the moment?
ADVANCED STATS(5-on-5 totals from Natural Stat Trick)
REGULAR SEASON TEAM STATS
Maple Leafs X-Factor: Anthony Stolarz
You have to go back half a century to find a Maple Leafs netminder who entered the post-season with numbers as good as Anthony Stolarz. Barring backups who saw limited action, no Toronto goaltender in the past 50 years has headed into the playoffs with a mark better than Stolarz’s league-leading .926 save percentage.
Dig deeper and Toronto’s No. 41 still comes out looking a dream. At 5-on-5, Stolarz’s .944 save percentage ranks best in the league among all netminders who’ve played at least 20 games on the year — just a hair above Vezina favourite Connor Hellebuyck. He ranks tops in the league in terms of high-danger save percentage at 5-on-5 too, and third in Goals Saved Above Average at 5-on-5, behind only Hellebuyck and Andrei Vasilevskiy.
Whether that means Stolarz heads towards Game 1 as the best in the league, or among the best in the league, or as the best in this series, matters little. What matters more is simply whether he’ll be able to make the saves the Maple Leafs need at the moments they need them most. It’s especially key for a Leafs squad that’s seen their fate decided by one-goal games time and time again over the past few years — the final three games against Boston last year; four of five games against Florida the year before; the final three games against the Lightning the year before that.
The margins have been slim, and having a netminder who can reliably make one more key save in one more key moment could prove crucial. And beyond Stolarz’s numbers as a whole this season, his play of late — eight straight wins down the stretch, including two shutouts and a .950 over that latest span — suggests he’s up to the task.
Senators X-Factor: Jake Sanderson
If there’s any fanbase that needs no reminding of the value of an elite blue-liner, it’s the Sens, whose most recent playoff success came off the stick of a prime, unstoppable Erik Karlsson. It’s been a rollercoaster of a journey for the Senators’ defence corps since the Karlsson Era ended, and the true heir to No. 65’s greatness has yet to emerge. But Ottawa clearly has something special in young Jake Sanderson.
Just 22 years old, in only his third big-league campaign, the Whitefish, Montana product has found his level this season. Calm, collected and lethal from the back end, Sanderson’s collected a career-best 55 points for the Sens in 2024-25, putting him top-10 league-wide in terms of scoring from the blue line. Maybe more impressive is the fact that the young rearguard really didn’t pick things up until the new year — over the past three months, since mid-January, Sanderson’s amassed 31 points in 36 games, the fifth-most of any NHL defender (behind only offensive behemoths Cale Makar, Rasmus Dahlin, Evan Bouchard and Victor Hedman) and level with rookie Habs sensation Lane Hutson.
Ask the 2024 Oilers whether finally having an elite scorer on the blue line made a difference in their efforts to find some meaningful playoff progress — on the heels of a regular-season breakout, Bouchard racked up 32 points during Edmonton’s 25-game Cup Final march, the second-most points of anyone in the playoffs, at any position.
Will Sanderson’s own emergence be enough to tip the scales in Ottawa’s favour? Time will tell. But after being thrown into the fire at the 4 Nations Face-Off just a few months ago — drawing into Team USA’s lineup for the tournament’s heated final tilt, and coming up with a big goal — there’s little doubt he can handle the weight of the moment.
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