Lightning vs. Maple Leafs odds, picks & prediction: Is Tampa Bay being overlooked in Game 1 opener?
For the second straight season the Toronto Maple Leafs will take on the Tampa Bay Lightning in the first round of the Stanley Cup Playoffs. And, wouldn’t you know it, the questions for each team are strikingly similar to the ones we asked one year ago.
The story with the Leafs is well known at this part. Toronto has all the money and talent in the world, but that hasn’t translated to on-ice success yet. The Buds have not made it past Round 1 of the Stanley Cup Playoffs since 2004, despite being favored (sometimes heavily) in each of their last three attempts.
The Leafs are -160 to win the best-of-7 against the Lightning this time around and there’s very little arguing that Toronto isn’t deserving of their status as the chalk in this series and in Game 1.
Lightning vs. Maple Leafs Prediction
Lightning money line, +135 (BetMGM)
Lightning vs. Maple Leafs Prediction: Analysis
You can make a salient argument that there is no team in hockey (or maybe even sports) that is more difficult to handicap than the Tampa Bay Lightning. After making their third consecutive trip to the Stanley Cup Finals in 2021-22, there were plenty of skeptics that wondered if Tampa would have enough in the tank for another marathon NHL season followed by the rigors of the Stanley Cup Playoffs. The Lightning seemed to quiet those doubters initially with a 35-16-2 record through their first 53 games, but then things started to go off the rails a bit.
That said, you could see why the Lightning may have taken their foot off the pedal. By that point in the season, the Lightning had basically secured their playoff spot and since the Boston Bruins were playing at a historic pace, Tampa and Toronto were all but guaranteed to meet in Round 1. In other words, the stakes were quite low for the Lightning and Leafs for the last 10 weeks of the season. You could forgive the Lightning for easing up down the stretch considering everything they’ve been through over the past three years.
Or perhaps the reason that Tampa Bay has struggled over its last 30 games of the season is just because the Bolts are not a great hockey team anymore. They’ve lost plenty of effective players from their championship seasons like Yanni Gourde, Blake Coleman, Ryan McDonagh and Ondrej Palat, and they’ve played more hockey than any team in a condensed amount of time, so perhaps they are finally out of gas.
Whatever side of the fence you land on with Tampa, you should feel pretty good about what to expect out of Toronto. The Buds were one of the league’s most consistent teams from start to finish and will go into Round 1 riding a four-game winning streak and a 10-3-2 stretch over their last 15 games.
Toronto is the better, deeper and fresher team, and that makes them deserving favorites, but that doesn’t mean this will be a stroll in the park for the Buds. In fact, there are some matchup issues here that actually make Tampa an intriguing underdog. The obvious edge for Tampa is in goal with Andrei Vasilevskiy set to take on Ilya Samsonov. Vasilevskiy has been the best goaltender in the NHL over the last five years and has been money in the playoffs, so even though Samsonov was strong in his first season with the Leafs, the edge is clear in this matchup.
Another area of concern for the Leafs is that the Bolts can match up with them in the talent department. Toronto is a team built on starpower and usually that is what the Leafs lean on to get separation from their opponents. But the Lightning are one of a few teams that can essentially go player-for-player with Toronto. Auston Matthews, Mitch Marner, William Nylander and John Tavares is an elite core, but the Lightning can answer with Nikita Kucherov, Steven Stamkos, Brayden Point and Mikhail Sergachev.
The Maple Leafs are the better team this season and they’re deserving of their status as a betting favorite, but it does feel like the betting market is overlooking a flawed-but-dangerous Lightning team in this spot. Getting goaltender Andrei Vasilevskiy and the Lightning as a +135 underdog is too good to pass up.
Moneyline: Lightning (+135) @ Maple Leafs (-160)
Puck Line: Lightning +1.5 (-200) @ Maple Leafs -1.5 (+165)
Total: 6 points
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