History Reveals Good News For the Toronto Maple Leafs Stanley Cup Aspirations
The Leafs have a talented core, the most important requirement for a championship. A stud goaltender is no longer necessary to win, but an elite defenseman is paramount.
The Toronto Maple Leafs recent playoff history is underwhelming.
The Toronto Maple Leafs have made the postseason for eight consecutive years during the Auston Matthews era but advanced to the second round only once.
A talented core of players has yet to find the formula for success beyond the regular season and patience is running thin within the team's fan base. Cries for significant change have increased.
Top-level talent, however, is needed to win titles. Trading it away comes with risk. Finding, keeping, and building around stars is the key to winning.
The Maple Leafs have a forward core comparable to Cup-winning teams. Their defense and goaltending have questions, but there is hope.
Toronto Maple Leafs Forwards Compare Favorably to Cup Winners
The Leafs trio of Auston Matthews, William Nylander, and Mitch Marner compare favorably to recent championship teams. Matthews is the NHL's best goal scorer. Nylander is a proven forty-goal scorer whose play continues to ascend. Marner is a 100-point winger (or at least, he's scored at a 100 points pace for 4 x seasons in a row without ever actually hitting the milestone) that plays in all situations.
The Florida Panthers have Matthew Tkachuk, Alexander Barkov, and Sam Reinhart. The Tampa Lightning have Nikita Kucherov, Brayden Point, and Jake Guentzel replacing the departed Steven Stamkos. Nathan MacKinnon and Mikko Rantanen have been long-time stars of the Colorado Avalanche.
Going back further, the Pittsburgh Penguins won Cups with Sidney Crosby and Evgeni Malkin. Jonathon Toews and Patrick Kane did the same with the Chicago Blackhawks. The Vegas Golden Knights won with Mark Stone and Jonathan Marchessault up front.
The Maple Leafs talent at forward is on par with those teams but has yet to put it together at the same time during the playoffs. Frustrating results aside, the team's strength up front should be kept together. Championship teams of the past all had multiple stars to share the load.
Parity Reigns Supreme in the NHL
League parity is another reason to be optimistic about the Leafs championship aspirations.
The Salary Cap artificially levels the competition and makes it so that no team is perfect, all teams are flawed, and injury luck has an outsized affect on the outcomes.
Seven teams have won a title during the last eight NHL seasons. Only the Lightning (2) have more than one Stanley Cup during that time.
As disheartening as all the early playoff exits and multiple Game 7 defeats are, the Leafs have become a more competitive postseason team. Immaturity cost them victories against lesser opponents like the Montreal Canadiens and Columbus Blue Jackets.
Injuries to Matthews, Nylander, and Joseph Woll were the difference in the most recent series defeat against the Boston Bruins. The Maple Leafs were the better team.
In 2022-2023, the Leafs defeated the Lightning and their championship pedigree before losing to the eventual Cup-Finalist Panthers.
Being in the Atlantic Division makes playoff success more difficult for the Maple Leafs. Forsix successive seasons, a team from this division has won or played for the Stanley Cup.
The difference between winning and losing in today's NHL is minuscule. It is especially difficult in the Atlantic Division.
There is Hope For Leafs Defense
The Maple Leafs defense has been their biggest weakness in recent years.
With the sudden retirement of Jake Muzzin and the shocking decling of TJ Brodie, the Leafs blue-line has been in tatters recently.
Last year the Leafs brought in reinforcements like Joel Edmundson and Ilya Lyubushkin, but the Leafs were then so bad at moving the puck that they didn't score more than two goals in a single game in their entire series against the Bruins this year.
Aaron Ekblad, Alex Pietrangelo, Cale Makar, and Viktor Hedman have anchored the defense for recent championship teams. Morgan Rielly, for all his positive attributes, is not in the same class. He needs help.
Through trades, draft picks, or free-agent signings, the Leafs have tried to support him with players such as Jake Muzzin, Timothy Liljegren, and T.J. Brodie. Their next attempt comes in the form of the free-agent acquisition of Chris Tanev.
That signing brings hope that the Leafs now have a defenseman who can fill the role vacated by Muzzin and elevate Rielly's game in the process.
Tanev and fellow free agent Oliver Ekman-Larsson provide the Maple Leafs with more depth and versatility than they've had in a few years.
Unheralded Goalies Have Won Championships
The days of requiring a workhorse, top-of-the-league goaltender to win a title are gone. Andrei Vasilevskiy and Sergei Bobrovsky are upper-echelon goalies who backstopped their teams to a Stanley Cup.
The other Cup-winning goalies are run-of-the-mill netminders. They did what was required to support the strong teams in front of them or raised their level of play at the right time. Adin Hill, Darcy Kuemper, Jordan Binnington, and Braden Holtby are lesser names that achieved titles.
Going back a bit further, current Leaf Matt Murray did the same as a member of the Pittsburgh Penguins.
Maple Leafs goaltender Joseph Woll has been a prime-time performer over the past two playoffs. An unfortunate injury sidelined him for Game 7 against the Bruins. Based on his brief playoff experience, he has shown to be just as capable as the unheralded goalies who have won a Cup.
The Toronto Maple Leafs have their issues, but they have strengths that make them a contender. Their players now understand the rigors of playoff hockey. They have multiple stars that are a necessity to win a championship. They have improved their blue line, giving it more balance and versatility.
The health and performance of Woll will be critically important. Tanev fighting off Father Time and elevating the defense will be key.
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The positives can get overshadowed and sometimes lost in hockey-centric Toronto, but the Leafs are still a championship contender.