Toronto Maple Leafs: Ranking the Last Decade of 1st Round Exits
By Andrew Kogut
The 2018-2019 Toronto Maple Leafs
The nerves are building as Toronto meets the dreaded Bruins yet again in the first round of the playoffs.
This time it’s the Toronto Maple Leafs that, finally, appear headed for victory. They secure a three games to two series lead after winning game five in Boston and actually appear to be outplaying their counterpart.
Andersen is looking good and Matthews has four goals in the first five games. Of course it’s Toronto and as we’ve already established, anything can happen. Boston wins the next two, Andersen has a shaky game seven and the Leafs are first round failures once again.
Matthews, with five goals and six points, leads the Leafs in scoring (Marner finishes two and four).
RANKING: Jeff Ware (15)
Forget the matchup, the random recent playoff seeding rules that potentially punishes quality teams and the youth/ability of the talented young roster: This was a series that Toronto needed to win.
Sure they lost Kadri again (this time for five games) but they had Tavares now and were in a prime position (game six at home) to seal the win. With the roster they had and the cap situation about to become extremely complicated, a first round loss was unacceptable. Hello Jeff Ware (26 years ago, technically, but I couldn’t leave him out) and your one point in 21 NHL games played.