The Toronto Maple Leafs will play the Ottawa Senators in the Eastern Conference First Round of the Stanley Cup Playoffs.

Toronto (51-26-4), which won the Atlantic Division with a 4-0 victory at the Buffalo Sabres on Tuesday, will have home-ice advantage in the best-of-7 series against Ottawa (44-30-7), which is the first wild card from the Eastern Conference.

“Yeah, it’ll be cool,” Maple Leafs captain Auston Matthews said. “I mean, it’s been a long time. Obviously, they’re a good young team. They’re hungry. They’ve taken steps as well. So, I think it’s going to be great. It’s going to be fun. It’s good for hockey. Obviously, it’s going to be intense. So, I think we’re looking forward to it.”

Said Senators forward Drake Batherson: “It’s awesome. I mean, we’d be happy with anyone, but I feel like everyone wants the Battle of Ontario. So, they’re going to get it and it should be a good one.”

The Maple Leafs have qualified for the playoffs each of the past nine seasons but with only one series victory in that span. They lost in seven games to the Boston Bruins in the first round last season. The Senators last made the playoffs in 2017, when they lost to the Pittsburgh Penguins in seven games in the conference final.

Forward Mitch Marner leads the Maple Leafs with an NHL career-high 100 points (27 goals, 73 assists) in 80 games, and forward William Nylander is second with 84 points and a team-leading 45 goals in 81 games. Forwards John Tavares (38), Matthews (32), Matthew Knies (29) and Bobby McMann (20) each also has at least 20 goals this season.

Goalie Joseph Woll is 26-14-1 with a 2.72 goals-against average, .909 save percentage and one shutout in 41 games (40 starts), and Anthony Stolarz is 21-8-3 with a 2.14 GAA, .926 save percentage and four shutouts in 34 games (33 starts).

“It’s going to be a tough matchup,” Ottawa coach Travis Green said. “It’s going to be an exciting matchup, though, I can tell you that. I think we talked about it last week where any team that we play is going to be a tough matchup — that’s the way playoffs are. ‘Exciting,’ is probably downplaying it a little bit. I mean, it’s going to be great. For the province, the Battle of Ontario is well known. And we haven’t been in the playoffs in a long time. It’s going to be exciting.”

The Senators are led by forwards Tim Stutzle, who has 76 points (23 goals, 53 assists) in 81 games, and Batherson, who has 65 points (24 goals, 41 assists) in 81 games. Forward Brady Tkachuk, who hasn’t played since March 30 because of an upper-body injury, has 55 points (29 goals, 26 assists) in 71 games.

Goalie Linus Ullmark is 24-14-3 with a 2.67 GAA, .911 save percentage and four shutouts in 43 games (42 starts), and Anton Forsberg is 11-12-3 with a 2.72 GAA, .901 save percentage and three shutouts in 30 games (27 starts). Leevi Merilainen, who was assigned to the American Hockey League in February, is 8-3-1 with a 1.99 GAA, .925 save percentage and three shutouts in 12 games (11 starts).

“Obviously they’re a very good team over there,” Marner said. “They make a lot great plays. They make it hard on you through the neutral zone and their D-zone. So, we got to be ready for that. We’ll do our scouting and figure out ways that we can work around it.”

Ottawa was 3-0-0 against Toronto in the season series, outscoring the Maple Leafs 9-3. Stutzle (two goals, one assist), forward Claude Giroux (one goal, two assists) and defenseman Thomas Chabot (three assists) each had three points. Ullmark was 2-0-0, allowing two goals on 50 shots (.960 save percentage), including a 27-save shutout in a 3-0 win on Nov. 12. Forsberg made 28 saves in his only appearance, a 2-1 win on Jan. 25.

Nylander, Matthews and McMann were the only Maple Leafs players to score in the season series. Woll allowed two goals on 23 shots in the 2-1 loss on Jan. 25. Stolarz was 0-2-0 with a 3.16 GAA and .908 save percentage.

Toronto and Ottawa have met four times in the postseason, with the Maple Leafs winning each series. They played four times in five seasons from 2000-04. Toronto won the most recent series, in seven games in the conference quarterfinals in 2004.

“They’re a really good team,” Stutzle said. “I mean, they have a lot of really, really good players. They’re going to be a hard team to play against. And like I said, I think if we play our game, we have a chance.”