Insiders: Could “Sunshine State Conspiracy” Tank Maple Leafs Playoff Hopes?

The Toronto Maple Leafs have been on a roll of late, winners of eight of their last 10 games, and surging into a four-point lead atop the Atlanta Division. It was seen as an absolute must for the Leafs to finish in 1st place so that they could avoid the Florida deadly duo of the Tampa Bay Lightning and the Florida Panthers in the first round of the playoffs.

But after watching the Florida Panthers on Sunday sit out Sam Bennett, Sam Reinhart, and Gustav Forsling in addition to the injured Sasha Barkov and Matthew Tkachuk, and then go on to drop their 5th game in a row, some are suggesting (tongue in cheek, we assume) that there's some sort of conspiracy going on.

The Panthers are now just two points up on the Ottawa Senators, who hold the first Wild Card spot. Should Florida drop below Ottawa and into a Wild Card spot, the first-place Leafs would have to face the defending Stanley Cup champs in the first round.

Are the Panthers and Marchand tanking to line up with a Leafs first round match up?!

We need investigators looking into this.
pic.twitter.com/TnbktCSUBG
— Spittin' Chiclets (@spittinchiclets) April 7, 2025

Insider Paul Bissonnette, on the TNT broadcast, put on his tin foil hat (literally), and jokingly put the theory out there that Marchand and the Panthers are tanking in order to line up that meeting with Toronto.

"I think Boston gave up Brad Marchand (to Florida) for nothing... and now somehow Florida, a great team, is gonna keep losing down the stretch... This is an inside job, (commissioner) Gary Bettman needs to look into it... what Paul Maurice and the Panthers are trying to do to my Maple Leafs... Gary—do your job!"

And to top off the Panthers' resting of their top players and their 5-game losing streak, we also saw the Tampa Bay Lightning losing to the lowly Buffalo Sabres on Saturday (after losing to Ottawa on Thursday), allowing Toronto to put some space between them at the top.

Insider Elliotte Friedman on the 32 Thoughts podcast joined in on Monday morning to discuss all this—also lightheartedly—about just what's going on in the Sunshine State:

It is... the 'Sunshine State Conspiracy'. Hated rivals Julien BriseBois (Tampa GM) and Bill Zito (Panthers GM) fixing the standings against the Toronto Maple Leafs! There are a lot of tin foil hats going around. Because it wasn't just the Panthers lineup, it was also, 'The Lightning are in on it' (which is what Friedman was told by a Hockey Night in Canada producer).

In truth, everyone was looking forward to the Battle of Ontario (Toronto vs. Ottawa) and the Battle of Florida (Bolts vs. Panthers) in the first round... But there's now a decent chance that none of that will happen.

"This could go in a lot of different directions among those four teams," added Friedman, in a much more serious vein (sans tin foil hat).

The Panthers have one against each of the Leafs and Lightning in their final five games, while Toronto has back-to-back games against the Panthers & Bolts this week. This is going to be an interesting battle to watch as the Atlantic Division heads down the home stretch.