November 2022 Is a Vital Month For the Toronto Maple Leafs

The Toronto Maple Leafs have started this season in much the same fashion they started their franchise record-breaking term last year.

On paper, the results are nearly identical; last year’s Toronto Maple Leafs team went 4-4-1 for the month, scoring 21 goals and giving up 29 against.

This season, the Toronto Maple Leafs are 4-4-2 for the month of October, having scored 27 goals and conceded 30.

It’s by no means an ideal way to start a season, but it’s certainly not as catastrophic as people might have you believe, except one key fact that is different this year.

Toronto Maple Leafs Must Lift Their Game In November

Last year, while the Toronto Maple Leafs didn’t put up a great record and October 2021 included 7-1 and 4-1 thrashings at the hands of the Pittsburgh Penguins and Carolina Hurricanes; they still looked halfway decent.

They were playing a decent possession game, defensively weren’t as bad as the goals against might suggest and were entering the zone with the puck, looking dangerous.

Auston Matthews had been very much limited on the scoresheet at this stage of the season, with just one goal and John Tavares was the team’s leading scorer but nobody was unduly concerned; it was just a slump.

Again, the similarities even with regards to the players are scary – John Tavares has been one of the few players this year that is performing at least close to his expected level and Matthews hasn’t been able to find the net.

By most counts the Toronto Maple Leafs, despite the results, looked like they would turn the page in November last year and that they did; riding the tails of a Vezina worthy (briefly) Jack Campbell to a near-perfect November with just 2 losses in 14 games.

November 2022 will be the month that decides the Toronto Maple Leafs’ fate this season. If they can’t find another gear and start playing, they could seal their own fate – whether that’s the departure of Sheldon Keefe as head coach or a big player trade to shake things up, because they can’t afford to trail too far behind in the Atlantic Division.

Right now, on the eye test alone, there’s a lot of work that needs to be done – the team isn’t playing as a cohesive unit. Instead of focusing on offence as the best form of defence, which we know has worked in the past; the Toronto Maple Leafs need to shift focus to everyone playing a 200-foot game.

At least if the team isn’t scoring, they can limit the opposition’s scoring and put themselves in with a chance of snatching one-goal games.

Expectations, after pushing the Tampa Bay Lightning to seven games and really looking to be a chance at times during that series, were at an all-time high to start the season.

A combination of Auston Matthews losing his scoring touch, the new signings not having the same impact as the summer’s departures and simply put the results not coming has everyone reeling.

This isn’t wholly on Sheldon Keefe to lead the Toronto Maple Leafs out of this mess. It’s on the players themselves to find a way to lift their games and truly take it to their opponents – it’s on them to show they genuinely care.

The sheer fact the team’s losses have occurred against the likes of the Arizona Coyotes and Anaheim Ducks is a real concern given these teams are expected to be basement-dwellers.

November 2022 is a vital month for the Toronto Maple Leafs; it could very well shape this team’s future far beyond just this season.