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A member of the Sportsnet panel during Monday’s Florida-Ottawa telecast put it succinctly about what pushes the Florida Panthers.

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“They just hunt you.”

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That’s what the Leafs learned to their detriment in being a quick kill last year in playoffs, a five-game series, extended to the Cats winning last month’s regular-season opener before another chance came up Tuesday at Scotiabank Arena.

“They’ve carried over what they did last season,” Toronto captain John Tavares said of them upsetting Boston, beating the Leafs and getting all the way to the final against Vegas. “They’re a potent offensive team that checks really well and is extremely stingy defensively. They show that in a lot of metrics in the way they play.”

The Leafs had made trades specific to weathering that kind of storm, including acquiring blueliner Jake McCabe, but lost two of those players to free agency, defenceman Luke Schenn and forward Ryan O’Reilly.

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They’ve now brought in Max Domi, Tyler Bertuzzi and Ryan Reaves, but after losing Justin Holl, there remains a challenge for the defence in responding to Florida’s aggressiveness.

“They’re on top of you all over the ice,” McCabe said. “(Last spring) getting down 3-0 early and trying to claw back, they took it to us with timely scoring, quality goaltending and we didn’t quite have it in that series.

“Competitiveness is definitely heightened (against them this year), urgency is heightened.”

UP TO SPEED ON PK

The Leafs went into Tuesday having killed 13 straight minor penalties during a four-game stretch, putting them back into the league’s top-20 units  at just under 78% after struggling early.

Newcomer winger Noah Gregor has been doing some grunt work — and earning himself a few breakaways and odd-man rushes in the process.

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“My speed definitely helps, trying to get good reads where I can get a jump on a defenceman (up top),” Gregor said. “I’m working in practice with our skills coaches on different things to try, but haven’t capitalized.”

Saturday against Pittsburgh’s Tristan Jarry was a good example. He stood his ground in the Toronto end, earned his free look and tried to skunk Jarry by deking one way and shooting the other.

“A lot of times, I’ve just settled for an outside shot which is fine, but I don’t think I realize how much space I have at different times. Maybe I should cut to the middle more, but he (Jarry) made a decent save on that one.”

Gregor was hardly ever utilized on the PK with San Jose, which did not re-sign him, leading to a PTO contract here.

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“I’ve been getting a fair amount of scoring chances, but you have to take care of your own end, too. We’ve been doing a pretty good job on the PK since Sweden. It starts with our goalies and we’re all on the same page now.”

J.T.’S TREE A FAMILY AFFAIR

Tavares’ Foundation posted video of his family of three children picking out their Christmas tree last week.

“Coming back from Sweden, that was one of the first things on my to-do list,” Tavares said. “I don’t get final say on the tree, but the kids had a blast and picked their own little tree as well.

“It’s that time of year along with hockey season, one of the great traditions of being Canadian.”

LOOSE LEAFS

McCabe on whether he’s still confused for former Leafs defenceman and now Panthers hockey exec Bryan McCabe: “Yeah, whether or not he’s my uncle,” Jake said with a laugh. “It’s happened a couple of times. I’ve actually never met him, but he was a good player here for a long time” … The Leafs went into Tuesday looking to avoid having their power play blanked in three straight games for the first time since last December … Tavares entered the game five points shy of becoming the 98^th player to reach 1,000.

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