The NHL playoffs are upon us, with the first games starting tonight (please ignore the regular season games occurring this afternoon and through next week). As strange as it feels to not have to wait five months for the post-season to start this go around, the unique divisional format this season has added intrigue to the proceedings; all of these teams are extremely familiar with one another, and almost everybody has a fighting chance.

With this in mind, I’ll be breaking down each division’s first round playoff matchups using my team cards (data provided by TopDownHockey) and additional microstats published by the hockey data firm SportLogiq through their new platform LogiqBets to see how these teams match up in the most important categories.