The Toronto Maple Leafs will play the Montreal Canadiens on Saturday night, in a regular season game with stakes higher than they’ve been since 2020-21. Despite the expectation from some that the Canadiens were destined for another year competing for the draft lottery, they’ve been playing some of the best hockey of anyone in the league since the trade deadline and all of a sudden look like they’re destined for their first postseason berth since making the Cup finals in that 2020-21 season.

Pair this with the fact that the young, playoff-hungry Canadiens always give the Leafs a tough time when the two teams play, and it’s safe to say that Saturday night’s Hockey Night in Canada classic will be a heated one. Maple Leafs head coach Craig Berube knows this and expects his team to know it, too.

“Throw that out the window,” Berube told reporters following the team’s optional morning skate on Saturday. “That’s not going to matter, because they’re going to come, they’re going to be excited to play us here. They always are. They give us a tough game every time we play them. I expect the same.”

The Maple Leafs were shut out 1-0 by the Canadiens on opening night, thanks to a 48-save shutout from goaltender Sam Motnembeault. They followed that up with two wins, a 4-1 win on home ice in November and a 7-3 blowout on the road back in January. While the score won’t reflect it, neither of these wins were walks in the park. And with the team’s core of Nick Suzuki and Cole Caufield both having experience beating the Maple Leafs in high-stakes games, they’ve got confidence other teams won’t have.

Those two players aren’t the only ones helping the Habs’ youth movement. They’ve since added first-overall pick Juraj Slafkovsky and Calder Trophy candidate defenceman Lane Hutson to the fold. In addition to this, 2024 fifth-overall pick Ivan Demidov is expected to join the Canadiens for their playoff run, but according to TVA’s Renaud Lavoie, won’t be in the lineup against the Maple Leafs.

Berube singled out Hutson on the back end, who has 64 points in 79 games in his rookie season so far, as somebody the Leafs will need to keep eyes on.

With a Leafs win on Saturday, they’ll extend their Atlantic Division lead to four points over the Tampa Bay Lightning, and it may lock the Canadiens into the second wildcard spot for a first-round matchup against the Washington Capitals provided there’s no last-minute slide. The Canadiens can also punch their ticket to the playoffs with a regulation win over the Leafs among a couple of other scenarios.

Puckdrop is at 7 PM eastern time.