The Florida Panthers split their season series with Toronto last season, with each team winning their home games, but failing to win away. Each game seemed to have a big moment, with Aleksander Barkov‘s hat trick in the Cats’ 3-2 OT win only canceled out by John Tavares‘ four goals in the Leafs’ 7-5 win in March.
These two teams have very similar expectations, with each aiming for the third seed in the Atlantic Division realistically, but both fan bases have expectations that the team can go even higher. This will be a huge series next year for both teams, as one loss could result in being the third-best team in the Atlantic from the first best wild card team.