Ottawa Senators vs Toronto Maple Leafs, NHL Picks

This projection and current market action are supplementary and do not influence the final qualitative pick and analysis of today's game.

Ottawa enters this game with the more complete profile across every dimension that shapes a side result. In the 2025-26 season, the Senators finished as a playoff-caliber club while Toronto struggled to stay well below break-even, and that record gap reflects genuine structural differences rather than noise. Ottawa's offense ranks among the more productive in the league, generating shots at a high rate with efficient conversion and one of the top faceoff win rates of any team, and that attack runs directly into a Toronto defense that gave up more shots than any team in the league during the 2025-26 season, pushing their goals-against into the bottom tier. Bobrovsky had a difficult 2025-26 season, finishing well below even with inconsistent resistance from one start to the next, while Ullmark was the more reliable and efficient of the two across a full and comparable workload. Toronto's injury report is longer and cuts deeper structurally, with Max Domi unavailable at center in a way that compounds an already serious defensive liability. Ottawa's penalty kill sits among the more vulnerable in the league and Toronto's is among the stronger units, which gives the Leafs a real path to keeping pace on special teams. The strongest counterargument is Ottawa's extended layoff since their last game, which introduces genuine rust as a real variable, but the advantages in offense, goaltending reliability, defensive matchup, and overall availability all run in the same direction and that volume of structural evidence does not reverse on one scheduling gap.

The case for the Over builds from both ends of the ice rather than leaning on just one team's offense. Ottawa carries one of the more productive attacks in the league during the 2025-26 season, with high shot volume and efficient conversion, and they run into a Toronto defense that gave up more shots than any team in the league and finished with goals-against in the bottom tier. Bobrovsky had a difficult 2025-26 season, allowing goals at a noticeably higher rate than most capable starters and finishing well below even, which means Ottawa's efficient offense meets a goalie who has been a consistent liability rather than a stabilizing force. Ottawa's penalty kill sits among the more vulnerable in the league, giving Toronto's power play, which sits right around the league average, real opportunities to add to the scoring from the other side. Even at the Senators' end, their defense suppresses shots well but goaltending inconsistency has kept their goals-against only around the league midpoint, meaning the game is unlikely to close down completely from that direction either. The strongest counterargument is Toronto's strong penalty kill and high shot-blocking rate, which give the Leafs real structural tools to keep their end low-scoring, but Bobrovsky's season-long inconsistency means the Leafs' own goals-against problem does not disappear regardless of how well Toronto defends at the other end. The goalie mismatch is the clearest single driver, because a leaky starter on one side makes the final score harder to suppress no matter what the other goalie contributes.