Toronto Maple Leafs: 3 x 30 Goal Scorers and Mitch Marner
By James Tanner
The Toronto Maple Leafs set their franchise record for wins in a season last night.
Of course, ties no longer exist, so it’s kind of an asterisk situation, but it’s still cool. The Toronto Maple Leafs are now just one point won by them or lost by their rivals from clinching, but that too has been a forgone conclusion for a while now.
What is the best, in my opinion, out of the myriad of interesting records/accomplishments that have gone down recently, is the Leafs having three thirty goal scorers.
When Auston Matthews scored 9 minutes and 24 seconds into last night’s game, he hit the 30 goal mark for the second straight season. In doing so, he became the third member of the Leafs, along with Nazem Kadri and James van Riemsdyk, to score 30 this season.
The Leafs are the only team to have three 30 goal scorers this year in the NHL.
Also impressive: The Leafs now have five 20 goal scorers as well. Should Nylander score three over the next five games, the Leafs could finish with six 20 goal scorers.
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Amazingly, Auston Matthews, despite missing 20 games, is only five goals behind Connor McDavid for the league lead in 5v5 goals. He is one away from being tied for second.
In Addition….
In addition to having three x 30 goal scorers, Mitch Marner has quietly become one of the best players in the NHL. The reason the Leafs are going to win the Stanley Cup, either this year or next year, is that in a salary cap world, you’re not supposed to have 3 x 30 goal scorers, let alone a guy who doesn’t fall into that category and isn’t your best player, but happens to be one of the league’s best players.
This year, In his first 17 games, Marner had 1 goal, 7 assists and ended up on the 4th line. People were (ridiculously) screaming about sophomore slumps and conveniently ignoring his 54% possession rating, low shooting percentage, and Andersen’s terrible save percentage when Marner happened to be on the ice.
But now Marner has 21 goals, 46 assists and 67 points.
That’s 59 points in his last 60 games. For context, even with the slow start he’s top 40 in NHL scoring, and there are only about 20 or so point-per-game players in the league. To make it even crazier, if you only look at the last 48 games, he has 51 points, including a current ten game point streak.
Currently, Mitch Marner is 20th in the NHL for total points/60. He is scoring more per minute of ice time than Crosby, Kopitar, Voracek, Matthews , Eichel, Tavares, and I could go on.
If you adjust for the first 17 games, Marner is essentially a top ten scorer. And he’s not even the best player on the team. That’s how good the Toronto Maple Leafs currently are.