Tampa Bay Lightning coach Jon Cooper made it clear this is not his side's first rodeo after an overpowering 7-3 road win against the Toronto Maple Leafs to open their first-round series on Tuesday.
The Lightning are coming off three consecutive Stanley Cup Finals appearances – including championships in 2020 and 2021 – and are trying to become the first team to reach four in a row since the New York Islanders' five from the 1979-80 season through 1983-84.
Against the Maple Leafs, Tampa Bay opening the scoring 78 seconds into the action through Pierre-Edouard Bellemare, before Anthony Cirelli and Nikita Kucherov added first-period goals to reach the intermission at 3-0.
Toronto clawed it back to 3-2 thanks to goals from Ryan O'Really and William Nylander, but that would be as close as they would get as the Lightning struck quickly with three goals of their own before the end of the second period to put the game away.
Brayden Point scored twice, Kucherov and Corey Perry collected a goal and two assists each, while Cirelli and Ross Colton also both scored and assisted in a stat-stuffing night for the Lightning.
Cooper said he knew his squad would be energised by the playoff atmosphere, even in a road environment.
"We've been there before," he said. "We've been down this road.
"To be honest, you embrace these moments, and the atmosphere at the beginning of the game, the anthems and the crowd going nuts, it's a wonderful experience. It's not something you should shy away from, and we talked to the guys about that.
"I will never question the guys in that [locker] room, and as the coach, you always want the best, but deep down inside you know there’s a whole bunch of gamers in that room… we knew they would come out to play."
Goal scorer Colton said he was hoping the Lightning would be able to "flick the switch" now that the important games have arrived.
"I think we were excited for it," he said. "I think for a while there we weren't playing the way that we wanted to play.
"We kept saying that we were going to flick the switch, and at some point we had to stop talking about it and start doing it.
"So the playoffs, against the Leafs, in this building – it was obviously electric."
Perry agreed, adding: "We had a tough March, a tough end of the season, but it's about the playoffs, and that's what we were doing. We're trying to get our game into shape to come in here and play."
Game 2 will remain in Toronto, before the series heads to Tampa Bay for Games 3 and 4.