The Ottawa Senators ran into an avalanche in their first playoff game since 2017. In the Battle of Ontario, the top-seeded Toronto Maple Leafs were energized by their home crowd and jumped all over the Sens, cruising to a 6-2 victory to get their nose out in front in this first-round series.

As expected, the Maple Leafs' crowd was on fire as Toronto has a chance to make a deep playoff run for the first time in a long time. The Leafs have only won one playoff series since 2004, so their fans are hungry for success. One common theme of Game 1 was the Toronto faithful going at Senators star Brady Tkachuk with “Brady sucks!” chants throughout the game.

Tkachuk himself doesn't care at all about the chants. After the game, Ottawa winger Claude Giroux also chimed in on the Leafs fans during Game 1, via Chris Johnston of The Athletic.

“In my eyes it's a compliment for Brady. I mean they don't do that if he actually sucks,” Giroux said. “I've gotten booed in Pittsburgh before and, I'll be honest, it was the best games to play.”

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Tkachuk is just getting his feet back under him after returning from an upper-body injury that kept him out for a large part of the end of the regular season, and you could tell during the Game 1 loss. The star winger didn't have his usual impact and didn't record a point in his playoff debut.

In order to come back and make this a series, the Senators will need their captain to show up and play his best hockey. During the regular season, Tkachuk scored 55 points (29 goals, 26 assists) in 72 games. If he doesn't start producing, this could be a quick series.

Maybe the quips from the Toronto fans will fire Tkachuk up and allow him to start imposing his will on this series. The Leafs had taken a 2-0 lead within the first 13 minutes of Game 1, so the Senators didn't even have time to get their feet wet in the game. However, Brady Tkachuk, Claude Giroux and company still have a big chance to steal a game on the road and go back home with a split in Game 2 on Tuesday night.