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1999-2000 The Last Time the Toronto Maple Leafs Won Their Division

By Andrew Kogut

TORONTO, ON - MAY 14 : Curtis Joseph of the Toronto Maple Leafs and his teammate, right wing Tie Domi #28, celebrate during game 7 of the Eastern Conference Semifinals of the NHL Stanley Cup Playoffs against the Ottawa Senators at Air Canada Centre in Toronto, Ontario, Canada on May 14, 2002. The Maple Leafs won 3-0. (Photo by Dave Sandford/Getty Images/NHLI)
TORONTO, ON - MAY 14 : Curtis Joseph of the Toronto Maple Leafs and his teammate, right wing Tie Domi #28, celebrate during game 7 of the Eastern Conference Semifinals of the NHL Stanley Cup Playoffs against the Ottawa Senators at Air Canada Centre in Toronto, Ontario, Canada on May 14, 2002. The Maple Leafs won 3-0. (Photo by Dave Sandford/Getty Images/NHLI) /
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Toronto Maple Leafs
OTTAWA, CANADA – MARCH 8: Anton Volchenkov #24 of the Ottawa Senators and Mats Sundin #13 of the Toronto Maple Leafs (Photo by Phillip MacCallum/Getty Images) /

The 1999-2000 Toronto Maple Leafs

The Leafs at the end of the old century and beginning of the new one where a big deal.  The year before, they had made the final four in the first season of Pat Quinn’s tenure behind the bench. This year, he was also the GM.  (Some of this information from Wikipedia.)

The Leafs roster didn’t feature much turnover from the 1998 version – Mats Sundin was still the captain, Curtis Joseph was starting his second season with the team, and Tomas Kaberle, after an excellent rookie season, was starting to establish himself as an elite defenseman, and Bryan Berard was exciting Leafs fans with his potential, also entering his second year with the team.

Though the roster was much unchanged to start, the Leafs made several trades throughout the season,  most significantly re-acquiring Wendel Clark for the third (and final) time.

For reference, here’s a comparison with the last Toronto Maple Leaf team that finished 1st in their division (all following stats from hockey-reference.com and rankings from yahoo.ca/sports):

1999-2000                                                                          2020-2021

Record:                      45-27-7-3 (100 points)               35-13-7 (77 points, 115 pt pace)

Points %:                   .610                                                    .700

Goals For:                 246 (4th)                                           185  (6th)

Goals Against:         222 (15th)                                        144  (6th)

Power Play %:          17.8                                                    20.3 (16th)

Penalty Kill %:          82.4                                                    78.3 (23rd )

TOP SCORERS

Mats Sundin:               73 points (73 games)               Mitch Marner:           67 points (55)

Steve Thomas:            63 points (81 games)               Auston Matthews:   66 points (51)

Jonas Hoglund:           56 points (82 games)                John Tavares:             50 points (55)

Igor Korolev:                46 points (80 games)                William Nylander:     42 points (50)

Yanic Perreault:          45 points (58 games)                 Morgan Rielly:           34 points (54)

GOALS

Mats Sundin:               32                                                      Auston Matthews:      41

Jonas Hoglund:           29                                                      Mitch Marner:               20

Sergei Berezin:           26                                                       John Tavares:                19

Steve Thomas:           26                                                       William Nylander:        17

Igor Korolev:               20                                                        Zach Hyman:                15

GOALTENDING

Curtis Joseph:        36-20-7                                                 Jack Campbell:            17-2-2

2.49 GAA                                                                                  2.11 GAA

.915 SV%                                                                                   .923 SV%

4 SO                                                                                            2 SO

13.4 Point Share                                                                     4.1 PS

As much as we all love Mats Sundin, I don’t think there is any question which version of the Toronto Maple Leafs is superior.

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