The Toronto Maple Leafs experienced yet another disappointing ending to their season.
What Went Wrong for Kyle Dubas and the Toronto Maple Leafs?
Well, nothing.
In an up and down season, where the Leafs played incredibly well to start, to another disappointing finish, Kyle Dubas put the blame on himself saying, “I know that I have to do a better job.”
But surely, it’s not his fault. Dubas made considerable moves in the offseason, signing John Tavares and Tyler Ennis (UFA on July 1st). And even more so before the deadline trading for Jake Muzzin. One thing that Dubas could’ve improved on was the signing of William Nylander and the timing of it, “The blame for the situation going that far has to go to me,” says Dubas, “I don’t think it set William up to have a good season”.
First Season for Rookie GM
Dubas did everything he could to help get the Toronto Maple Leafs on track and in the conversation as Stanley Cup contenders. And a lot of people think that he passed the test given to him by Brendan Shanahan. Dubas even went on to apologize for the game 7 loss against Boston, “That falls on everybody, starting with me, not the coaching staff, not the players.”
But, what’s interesting is that he couldn’t give a definitive answer on whether or not the coaching staff will be here next year, “With how fluid the situation is, I wouldn’t give any guarantee to anybody in our whole organization.” So, with that being said, even Dubas’ job isn’t safe according to himself, but I doubt he’ll be going anywhere any time soon.
But, it’s not just the losses and signings he’s apologizing for.
This season, the Leafs PK had a 56.3% penalty kill percentage, which ranked them 15th. And their power play percentage was 18.8%, which got them to 10th in the NHL. However, it changed in Round 1 against the Bruins. In the series, the Leafs had a 17.6 PP% and a 53.3 PK%. It’s not a drastic letdown, but it’s not good either.
And even with this being on Mike Babcock, Dubas still takes the blame for special teams too, “I think I can do a better job at arming our roster and arming our coaching staff with players that can help us,” says Dubas on the need for more depth, “I think the penalty kill, I think the blame should go to me.”
Both the Toronto Maple Leafs power play and penalty kill have some of the Leafs best players on them. The first PP unit consists of Auston Matthews, John Tavares, Mitch Marner, Morgan Rielly and before the suspension, Nazem Kadri, which isn’t a bad first unit by any means. And even the first PK unit was considerably good with Marner on there as well, with Zach Hyman, Ron Hainsey and Nikita Zaitsev.
Dubas provided the players and he shouldn’t be at fault for the coaches execution of lines that were set on the power play and the penalty kill. But, Babcock still says that “we need more” in terms of depth.
While Dubas is taking the blame for almost every bad thing that’s happened this season, which is still very interesting. The only thing that he’s really at fault for is the timing of the Nylander signing, everything else should be on the coaching staff.
Dubas was asked about the coaching staff's performance in Game 7 specifically and responded instead on their performance in the year as a whole.
— James Mirtle (@mirtle) April 25, 2019
But, since the season is now over, Dubas knows he has to start talks with Marner and Darren Ferris and after that deal is done, then he’ll get on to Andreas Johnsson and Kasperi Kapanen. While he’s doing that, he has to work on the possibility of signing Jake Gardiner and the potential of trading some players.
Before that comes, Shanahan has to review the management’s work, and with the probability very high on nothing happening to Dubas, Babcock and the rest of the coaching staff are in a different boat.