Maple Leafs' playoff woes continue as Lightning embarrass Buds in series opener

John Tavares didn't have an answer. Sheldon Keefe didn't sense any nerves.

Once the puck dropped, however, one team was confident in its battle-tested, championship pedigree.

The other froze at the first opportunity to once again — finally — flip its long playoff script.

The Tampa Bay Lightning built a 3-0 lead in the first period and survived a brief scare on the way to humiliating the Toronto Maple Leafs 7-3 in Game 1 of their first-round playoff series Tuesday.

"It's a hard one to explain, no doubt," said Tavares, Toronto's captain. "We're disappointed."

The Leafs are looking to end an ugly string of post-season failures that have seen the Original Six franchise fail to advance since 2004 or hoist the Stanley Cup since 1967.

There wasn't much desperation in their playoff curtain-raiser.

"We were on our heels a bit early on," Keefe, in his fourth post-season as Leafs head coach, said of his team's disastrous start.

WATCH l Maple Leafs fall to Lightning 7-3 in Game 1:

Brayden Point scored twice, while Nikita Kucherov and Corey Perry both added a goal and two assists for Tampa. Anthony Cirelli and Ross Colton chipped in with a goal and assist each.

Pierre-Edouard Bellemare also scored for the Lightning, who connected on four power plays. Andrei Vasilevskiy made 28 saves in his 100th playoff start.

"We have a plan, we stuck to it," Perry said. "It's something that works. Everybody's buying in."

Ryan O'Reilly, William Nylander and Calle Jarnkrok replied for Toronto. Mitch Marner had three assists. Auston Matthews added two of his own.

The Leafs have lost seven straight series dating back to 2013, including six in a row with the talented core led by Matthews, Marner and Nylander. Tavares has gone 0-5 since signing on in 2018.