The Toronto Maple Leafs have not been very nice to Sheldon Keefe, letting him twist in the wind for weeks now.
The Toronto Maple Leafs might keep him on after hiring Brad Treliving, but they shouldn’t.
Keefe has shown that he makes terrible lineups and that doesn’t do anything to give the team an edge.
Sure, he’s got a great winning percentage in the regular season, but with this roster, literally anyone could have done the same thing.
The Leafs need a new look, and in the NHL there aren’t a lot of better ways to accomplish that than with a new coach.
Toronto maple Leafs Need a New Coach
The Leafs should fire Keefe so he can join Dubas in Pittsburgh.
The Leafs should bring in a new voice, maybe someone like Bruce Boudreau, Dallas Eakins or someone new and exciting we’ve never heard of.
The problem with Sheldon Keefe – besides being too smug – is that the Leafs have some of the best players in the world, and he makes terrible lineup decisions.
He eventually used Ryan O’Reilly as the 3rd line centre, but seemed to resist it for weeks. He constantly dressed 11/7. He over used Justin Holl. He was reluctant to put Matthews with Nylander. He took Nylander off the top power-play unit.
He for some reason stacked one power-play line, but then only used them for one minute.
He consistently failed to get Auston Matthews the kind of ice time Connor McDavid gets.
Many Leafs games would finish with stupid things happening like Luke Schenn skating for more minutes than Auston Matthews.
He used Luke Schenn on his top pairing in the playoffs.
The Leafs, under Keefe, didn’t seem to rush the puck much, nor did they seem to get a lot of rebounds. They were always among the lowest penalized teams, and subsequently always got near the lowest amount of power-plays.
I don’t like the style Keefe plays with such a talented team, and I hate his lineup construction.
He needs to be fired. The Toronto Maple Leafs need to bring a coach who likes to rush the puck, play dirty, and take/receive a lot penalties. Keefe likes to have his players possess the puck until there is a good chance. It’s much better just to fire the puck on the net and try for rebounds.
To conclude, Sheldon Keefe is a crappy coach and the Toronto Maple Leafs need to hire a better one. They also better not do anything stupid like keep Keefe around so they can sacrifice him in the middle of the season at the first sign of trouble.
He’s got to go, and go now.