1999-2000 The Last Time the Toronto Maple Leafs Won Their Division
A 3-2 victory over Montreal last Saturday marked the Toronto Maple Leafs first division win since the 1999-2000 season.
In the 21 years that followed, a Conference Finals loss to Arturs Irbe and the Carolina Hurricanes and Conference Semi-Finals losses to the Devils and Flyers have been about the best the Toronto Maple Leafs have been able to muster.
This year’s first-place Leafs squad, however, looks poised to change that underwhelming history.
With depth at every position and a considerable mix of veteran and physical presence (not to mention a path to the Finals that will never be this undemanding), Toronto is salivating at the chance to potentially ride their number 1 seeding all the way to the Finals.
Sadly, this year and the 1999-2000 North East Division Champs are the only two Leafs teams to ever win a division title outside of the 1930s. Now, technically, the Leafs did finish first over a few times during the six-team era when there were no divisions, so the dubiousness of their lack of titles is lessened somewhat, but really, there is no excuse for wining just a single division between 1967 when the league expanded and this year.
Let’s check in on that 1999-2000 team.
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.
Other notable players on the 1999-2000 team
In February of 2000, Leaf coach and general manager Pat Quinn sent Mike Johnson, Marek Posmyk, two 5th-round picks and a 6th-rounder to the Tampa Bay Lightning for Darcy Tucker, a 4th-round pick and a 5th-rounder. Tucker suited up in 27 regular season games for the Leafs, piling up 7 goals and 17 points. He also scored four goals and had six points in 12 playoff contests, tying him for fourth on the team in playoff scoring.
Dmitri Khristich, in limbo after Boston refused to match his arbitration award, was acquired early in the season for a 2nd-round pick. After eclipsing 70 points the previous year, Khristich underperformed in Toronto, managing just 12 goals and 30 points in 53 games. His numbers dwindled even further in the playoffs where he totaled a lone goal and three points in 12 games.
Youth on Defense
The 99-00 Leafs also had a talented young blue-line. 21-year old Tomas Kaberle (40 points in 82 games, 6.4 PS), 23-year old Danny Markov (+13, 2.8 PS) and 22-year old Bryan Berard (30 points in 64 games, 5.1 PS) were already making an impact (Unfortunately, Berard suffered a season-ending eye injury against Ottawa that year and the Leafs lost a player with the potential to have been an all-time great).
Dmitry Yushkevich (4.5 point share), Cory Cross (3.8 point share) and Alexander Karpovtsev (3.7 point share) rounded out this very strong defensive group.
Veteran Depth
Like the current incarnation of the Toronto Maple Leafs, the 1999-2000 team also had some strong veteran leadership. Steve Thomas, at 36, finished second in regular season scoring and then led the team in playoff scoring with 9 points in 12 games. Garry Valk, 32, enjoyed a solid season.
So too, did the 30-year old Tie Domi played 70 games in the regular season and all 12 post season games, combining for more than 200 penalty minutes. Gerald Diduck, 34, had a 0.7 PS in only 26 regular season games and played 10 more in the playoffs.
And while Leaf favourite Wendel Clark (In his last season for the Leafs and in the NHL) didn’t exactly contribute much offensively (four points in 20 games, two in six playoff matches), it was an admirable end for a player who left it all on the ice and who was ultimately finished at age 33.
Cujo and the playoffs
The 1999-2000 Toronto Maple Leafs may have fallen to the New Jersey Devils in six games in the Conference Semi-Finals but that wasn’t due to their lack of quality goaltending.
Curtis “Cujo” Joseph in 12 playoff games had a 2.06 GAA, a .932 SV% and one shutout. In the series against New Jersey his SV% was .923, which was identical to his counterpart, Martin Brodeur. The Leafs only being able to muster 9 goals in those six games was the main culprit in this playoff exit.
But one thing that really stands out about the 1999-2000 Leafs team is the amount of scoring depth. Including a perennially productive Mats Sundin campaign where he scored 32, 11 players had double-digits in goals that whole season (six with 20 or more) and 14 players had at least 20 points.
The scoring did dry up in the playoffs though, as the team only managed 26 goals in their 12 playoff games. Cujo and the defense played well but ultimately the team was no match for a stacked Devils roster that finished the season 2nd in goals for, 7th in goals against and featured names of the likes of Brodeur, Elias, Sykora, Arnott, Gomez, Niedermayer, Stevens, Rafalski, Mogilny, Madden, Pandolfo and Claude Lemieux. No wonder they won the Cup.
2021 playoffs on the horizon
As shown above, finishing first does obviously not ensure a free pass through the playoffs. The Toronto Maple Leafs cannot afford to take any team for granted and are probably one early exit away from a major overhaul.
Their current forward group has more high-end talent than the 99-00 team and the defense, with Sandin in the lineup, has comparable talent and skill. The older team takes it in terms of sandpaper and while Campbell has been fantastic this year in the Leafs net, he is an unknown playoff commodity. Advantage to Joseph. The collection of depth on this current Leafs team is also quite impressive, with decent contributors like Alex Galchenyuk and Pierre Engvall not even guaranteed a spot in the playoff line-up.
Next. Leafs Top 10 Prospects. dark
If Campbell continues his stellar play and some of this depth that I’m raving about steps up and complements the stars, we could be looking at a much better fate than that last division-winning Leafs team. Cu-JO LEAFS Cu-JO!