Toronto Maple Leafs forward Kasperi Kapanen, left, and forward Jason Spezza hang their heads after a loss to the Columbus Blue Jackets Game 5 of a best-of-five playoff qualifier on Sunday in Toronto.John E. Sokolowski/USA TODAY Sports via Reuters
Seventy-two hours later, the Maple Leafs were coming to grips with another lost season. Unlike the previous three, this one did not end in the first round of the Stanley Cup playoffs. This time, they lost in a play-in tournament for the right to get there.
Toronto was partly undone by the Columbus Blue Jackets, but mostly by a lack of consistency that had been a problem since this pandemic-plagued campaign kicked off in October. That, and its biggest players disappeared in Sunday’s 3-0 loss in an elimination game.
The team had months to prepare for its engagement in the qualifying round, and still ended up with nothing to show for it. Patience is wearing thin, both for the players and their fans. It’s not even about winning a Stanley Cup for the first time in 53 years. It is about showing improvement and winning its first postseason series since 2004.
“Fan anger is justified,” Zach Hyman, Toronto’s hard-working forward, said Wednesday. The team arranged video calls among journalists and 10 players as well as coach Sheldon Keefe and management. “This loss has hit the hardest for me. When you envision the team moving on, after preparing for months, for it to end so quickly is frustrating. I understand where the fans are coming from.
“Growing up a fan myself, I know what it means to care for the Maple Leafs, to bleed blue and white. I get it. It sucks, and we’re building toward being in a position where it is going to stop sucking.”
The season started poorly, which cost Mike Babcock his job behind the bench. Then the team seemed to right itself and had worked its way into a playoff position when games were stopped on March 12 because of the spread of the novel coronavirus.
In Columbus, the Maple Leafs drew an opponent that would not have made it to the postseason if the format hadn’t been changed to include 24 teams instead of the usual 16. Then they were outworked and outplayed by the lunch-bucket Blue Jackets. In three losses, they were shut out twice and blew a three-goal lead in the other.
“I don’t know how to explain it, or why we can’t get the job done,” Mitch Marner said. The right winger signed a US$11-million-a-year-contract in September. “In our minds and in the minds of a lot other people, we are a much better team and haven’t been showing it.
“We’re not happy with it. We are not happy going home for the rest of the summer.”
This was the season that the team promised would be different. The year when it would finally make a breakthrough. There wasn’t one, and in the end it seems like there are more questions than there were at the beginning: a patchwork defence, erratic goaltending, a lack of grit. And none of these are new problems. They are old ones that are yet to be solved.
“This group needs to dig in more,” said Jake Muzzin, the veteran defenceman and one of the few players willing to throw his body around. He previously won two Stanley Cups while playing for the Los Angeles Kings. “The will to win has to burn a little hotter. Once we find that, we’ll be dangerous.
“It takes time. I think we are close and the frustration I have seen will fuel us to the next level. Guys are frustrated and I hope that stays with us until we get another chance.”
There were some high points: Auston Matthews’s 47 goals during the regular season and his continued development toward becoming a more complete player; Morgan Rielly’s performance in the five-game series against Columbus; William Nylander’s career-high 31 goals and Hyman’s 21 in an injury-abbreviated campaign.
In the end, those, personal accomplishments become somewhat meaningless. They will be forgotten; what folks will remember more is that the team failed to succeed when it counted. Again.
“Having a good regular season isn’t cutting it anymore,” Matthews said. “Four years in a row [of losing during the postseason] is a little frustrating and embarrassing as well. There have to be steps taken or moves made. I don’t know what that is."
Toronto is unlikely to re-sign defencemen Tyson Barrie or Cody Ceci. The former, acquired in a trade with Colorado for Nazem Kadri, never really fit in. Ceci was only average, and not much beloved by fans. The Leafs will likely have to trade one of their top four players – likely Nylander – to bolster their blueline. But even Nylander is probably not good enough bait to acquire a game-changing defenceman.
And what to do about goaltender Frederik Andersen? He has one year left on his contract and will certainly want a lot more the next time. He struggled at times this year, and has given up soft goals in the playoffs since he arrived in Toronto.
These were not the sort of discussions the Maple Leafs expected to be having this offseason. They expected to be revelling in their accomplishments. Instead, there are a messy few months ahead.
“Like our players, we are extremely disappointed,” said Brendan Shanahan, the president and alternate governor of the Maple Leafs. “We certainly have higher expectations. There are no excuses being made here. Nobody is feeling sorry for themselves.
“It’s about finding solutions and getting over the hump. In some ways, we have taken a step back.”
Kyle Dubas, the Toronto general manager, said the team is far below where it should be with the talent it has. Being in the middle, he said, is not good enough.
“My goal will be to put us in a better position next year, and for us to be a contending team year in and year out,” Dubas said. “I would love for the progress to be linear, but in life, athletics and business, progress never follows the straight line you want it to.
“Lots of teams have significant ups and downs as they are on the way to where they want to go.”