Toronto Maple Leafs: Ranking the Last Decade of 1st Round Exits
By Andrew Kogut
The 2017-2018 Toronto Maple Leafs
After a spirited series against Washington the preceding year, expectations are on the rise as 3rd-place Toronto skates into Boston to face the 2nd-place Bruins.
Fresh off a 105-point season and finishing 2nd overall in goals, Leaf fans watch in horror as Toronto gets spanked 5-1 and 7-3, respectively, in the first two games of the series. They end up going down to Boston, again, three games to one and, again, storm back to tie the series at three.
Game seven isn’t a close one as Boston smokes Toronto 7-4 and seals the series win in seven. Pastrnak leads Boston with 13 points (followed by Marchand with nine) while Marner tops Toronto with nine points (Matthews finishes with one goal and two points).
RANKING: Luke Schenn (5)
Schenn blasted onto the scene in Toronto before leaving with a whimper which, to me, perfectly describes this series. Toronto had a great season in 2017-2018 but ultimately were outplayed pretty significantly by Boston in this round.
Granted Andersen was awful (.896) and Kadri missed the last three games but Rask didn’t play much better and Toronto couldn’t touch the Marchand-Bergeron-Pastrnak combo. Based on the hype, quite disappointing.