Analyst predicts Toronto Maple Leafs to miss playoffs

It would be disastrous if the Toronto Maple Leafs would miss the playoffs after the 2025-26 season. Well, one analyst who is very smart and dives into the numbers for just about everything, is predicting exactly that.

On Monday morning, HockeyViz.com, one of the premier websites that combs through all the NHL data and has wonderful visuals to really understand what's happening on the ice more, published their season preview. Just a couple weeks before the 2025-26 NHL season kicks off, the predicted end results after 82 games should end up making Leafs Nation miserable.

The whole article is worth the read but to boil it down to the simple point projection, the most likely out come after thousands of season simulations is that the Maple Leafs will finish the year with 89 points. Within the prediction, that is tied with the Florida Panthers but because of some other potential factors, the Panthers are in that final playoff spot, and the Leafs are on the other side.

It's not even the fact that the Leafs are predicted to miss the playoffs. It's that the Buffalo Sabres of all teams finish with 91 points. While we can't really argue with someone's statistical model without looking a little silly, just the thought of the Sabres of all teams finishing above the Maple Leafs and being in the playoffs is infuriating. The Maple Leafs' nine-year streak of playoffs comes to an end and the Sabres make the playoffs for the first time since 2011.

The rest of the Atlantic also features the Ottawa Senators finishing with 100 points -- which is just a three-point improvement on last season so it's not crazy -- and then the Tampa Bay Lightning winning the division with 107 points and the fifth-best record in the NHL. Those both feel realistic, at least.

The reasoning for the Maple Leafs' departure from the playoffs and collapse from a 108-point team that finished on top of the division and just nine points from the President's Trophy, all the way to missing the playoffs entirely, to our understanding, basically boils down to the loss of Mitch Marner. At 5-on-5, the Leafs grade out as below-average offensively and slightly above-average defensively. For the special teams' impact, the Leafs are still above-average on the power play but nowhere near as good as they were in past seasons, and are below on the penalty kill.

That all boils down to a bubble playoff team, which makes sense, but it would feel crazy to think that the power play would suddenly drop to being "just fine" and the 5-on-5 offense would be almost non-existent.

Of course, this doesn't factor in Auston Matthews being healthy once again and something like Nicolas Roy having a bigger role on his team than he did with the Vegas Golden Knights, but it still feels wild.

I guess, we'll see if they're right, but I think the entire city will burn down soon after if this comes true.