The Toronto Maple Leafs are not having the year that we envisioned them having back in the summer.
It goes without saying that no one was expecting the NHL to postpone and potentially cancel the rest of the season, but for the sake of our sanity, I think it best to continue on writing about the Toronto Maple Leafs as if there will be a season and a Stanley Cup this year.
That may or may not be what happens, but if we can’t watch hockey to distract ourselves, we can at least still argue about it with our friends!
The Toronto Maple Leafs finished last season by taking the eventual Cup Finalist Boston Bruins to seven games in the first round.
The worst part of the loss was having to hear people repeat the narrative about the Leafs needing to be a tougher, grittier team like the Bruins, despite the fact that the Leafs outplayed Boston over the seven games, and perhaps even deserved the win.
There’s no shame in losing to the team that has been the best in the NHL for nearly a decade, and the Leafs didn’t so much “lose” as “take a major step in gaining experience for their young team.”
But instead of a feel-good narrative like “young team takes necessary step in evolution to championship,” somehow the Toronto Maple Leafs are a disappointment because their 22 year old core couldn’t beat a team that had contended for the Stanley Cup for a decade straight.
Sure, this year’s team has been terribly inconsistent, and often nights just plain terrible. But you would be forgiven, given the coverage of the team, if you didn’t realize they were still the league’s seventh youngest team, in year five of the vaunted five-year rebuild.
Again, I acknowledge that it hasn’t been the best season. From a six game losing streak that seems to have ended Mike Babcock’s career, to the failure to get even one win from their back-up goalie for several months, to the recent West Coast Debacle, the team has tested the patience of even their most optimistic fan.
Just kidding!
That fan is me, and I remain extremely optimistic. So I am here to take you through the reasons why you should ignore the doomsayers and believe in this team.
And there are a lot of them. You wouldn’t know it by the coverage the team gets, but they are gaining ground in the standings.