Early projection on who will win the Atlantic Division is released

Evolving Hockey has projected the Leafs to not only finish first in the Atlantic division with 109 points, but first overall in the Eastern Conference. They are also projecting the Leafs to finish 1 point behind the projected President's Trophy winners and defending Stanley Cup champion Colorado Avalanche. It's good news because only 3 times in the last 20 years has the President's Trophy winner gone on to win the Stanley Cup.

While Tampa has lost some key players due to cap constraints, and Florida decided Matthew Tkachuk was better than 115 point Jonathan Huberdeau and top-4 defenceman MacKenzie Weegar, the Leafs haven't lost any of their top contributors while adding more physical, grinding players to improve their bottom six with the likes of Nicholas Aube-Kubel and Zach Aston-Reese (if he does indeed lock down a contract following his PTO).

The biggest point of contention for the Leafs to win the Atlantic will be on goaltending - as it has been for the better part of a decade. Will Matt Murray and Ilya Samsonov provide the stability between the pipes that Jack Campbell, Frederik Andersen and Petr Mrazek were unable to provide consistently over the past few seasons?