A quarter-century ago. And it feels just like … a quarter-century ago.
Once upon a time, the Maple Leafs had the Senators’ number, right?
“Never,’’ says Mats Sundin. “Never.’’
He means that the club he captained, wherever º£½ÇÉçÇø¹ÙÍøhad finished in the standings relative to Ottawa, at no time assumed they had the playoffs in the bag against the usually inferior team at the other end of Highway 401.
Unlike, say, when the latter-days iteration of the Leafs came a-cropper against the low-likes of Columbus in the COVID bubble qualifying series of 2020. Or a year later, when the Northeast Division-topping Leafs choked on a three-games-to-one lead against Montreal, worst team to make the playoffs, 18 points behind Toronto.
“Every year we obviously realized that we had a good chance to win,” Sundin was recalling down the line from Stockholm. “But it’s good to have a little bit of fear that you’ll lose the series. That combination of confidence and fear is what you need to be able to compete at the level that’s required to win a long series.
“I remember the series against Ottawa were always the toughest ones, in terms of being physical. It was the Battle of Ontario, year after year. There were so many dimensions that made it special. But it’s such a fine line between winning and losing. At the end of the day, whoever wants it most is probably going to move on.”
Mats Sundin blasts one past Senators netminder Tom Barrasso during the Leafs’ Game 6 win at the Corel Centre on April 24, 2000.
Peter Power/º£½ÇÉçÇø¹ÙÍøStarIt’s impossible to measure want, beyond examining the entrails of all the playoffs that got away from º£½ÇÉçÇø¹ÙÍøin the era of Auston Matthews and Mitch Marner in eight straight post-season appearances. The Leafs of today pooh-pooh the past, even though it’s hardly ancient history. And coach Craig Berube — who certainly had nothing to do with it — hasn’t had his players on the analyst’s couch to psychologically purge painful memories. “That’s in the past,” he said. “I don’t talk to them about it.”
Except these recent yesteryears are in the team’s DNA. While the roster has changed over to a huge extent — as have the coaches and the general manager — its pith remains the same: Matthews, Marner, Morgan Rielly, John Tavares. Playoff ripened, of course, playoff scarred. What remains to be seen, starting on Sunday, is whether they’re also playoff annealed — like the honed steel in a forged sword.
In the Senators, the Leafs are confronting a rival that has cleaned their clock in this regular season. While º£½ÇÉçÇø¹ÙÍøcan look down on Ottawa from its perch atop the Atlantic Division, and the Senators squeezed into the post-season as a wild card, upsets are a common feature of the mayhem opening round.
The Leafs have given us a much different feel going into the Stanley Cup playoffs than the previous eight attempts, writes Nick Kypreos.
The Leafs have given us a much different feel going into the Stanley Cup playoffs than the previous eight attempts, writes Nick Kypreos.
“Finishing in first place in one of the toughest divisions in hockey is not easy to do,” says Max Domi, who’s dad Tie was a central figure in all those playoff tilts against the Senators. “But that’s all behind us now.”
º£½ÇÉçÇø¹ÙÍøand Ottawa have crossed sabres four times in the contemporary era — 2000, 2001, 2002, 2004 — with the Senators each time getting handed their hat. Though it’s been more than two decades since their last wrangle, history hangs heavy for them, too. They don’t want to hear about it either.
The Leafs don’t appear to be suffering from smugness, which was arguably a fatal flaw in some of their previous playoff failures. Several are coming off career seasons: Marner, William Nylander and a rejuvenated Tavares, who’s put up his second-best career numbers, a formidable force since the 4 Nations Face-Off.
In Anthony Stolarz they have a Vezina-worthy goalie. Matthews has rediscovered his groove — scored his 33rd goal in Thursday’s season-ender against Detroit — and maybe he’s finally completely healthy. Doctors pulled him midway through Game 4 against the Bruins last spring and he sat out Games 5 and 6. Blinding migraines kept Nylander out of the first three games in that series.
This time ‘round, everybody seems healthy and hale, with Berube saying he’s “fairly confident’’ that Jake McCabe, Oliver Ekman-Larsson and David Kämpf will be good to go for Game 1.
º£½ÇÉçÇø¹ÙÍøshould get a boost also from its avid travelling camp of followers who plan to make the trek to Kanata for the away games. It’s always got up the nose of the Senators that the crowd at the Canadian Tire Centre is often a sea of blue and white. They’ve strategized to avoid that spectacle this year by maximizing ducats for season-ticket holders, keeping them out of the grubby hands of Leafs devotees.
In Sundin’s memoir “Home and Away,’’ the popular franchise icon reveals the good times and the bad in his 13 years with Toronto.
In Sundin’s memoir “Home and Away,’’ the popular franchise icon reveals the good times and the bad in his 13 years with Toronto.
“That’s going to be key going into a tough building like Ottawa,” notes Domi. “It’s going to be nice to have support there. But at the end of the day, it doesn’t matter. Every game is going to be an absolute war.”
We don’t much like the war analogy for sports. Any more than we like the tired trope of the Battle of Ontario. Blame the media, which can’t come up with anything more neo-buzzy.
Who will dare predict how this series will unfold? And might this be Toronto’s year, all the way to the final?
“Ha-ha-ha,” chortles Sundin, ducking divination. “I think º£½ÇÉçÇø¹ÙÍøis in a great position to have a great run. We keep believing, right?”
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