The Toronto Maple Leafs are off for two weeks while the 4 Nations Face-Off goes down.
At first I was skeptical of this tournament and concerned about injuries costing the Toronto Maple Leafs their chance at a Stanley Cup, but honestly, after about five minutes of watching I was sold. This is just so much better than anything but playoff hockey.
As to the Leafs and what they should do to win the Stanley Cup, I believe that, outside of just getting lucky ( and that could happen If Auston Matthews and a goalie get hot at the same time, the Leafs could go all the way with their current roster) there is just one thing they can put them over the top.
If the Leafs want the best shot they can get at the Cup, there is just one thing for them to do.
The Toronto Maple Leafs Can Win the Stanley Cup If.....
That's it. That's the only thing standing between them and having the best roster in the NHL.
People talk about depth scoring, but it's not an issue, not really. The Leafs have four elite scoring forwards and Knies, and McMann. That's more scoring than practically any other team. The Leafs problem (besides the fact that they need to spread their three franchise players across three lines) is their blue-line.
The Leafs blue-line lacks a high-end puck mover/ number-one defenseman, and is overall below average at moving the puck. This is a major problem when you have four elite forwards.
By adding Noah Dobson, the Leafs get the elite number-one defenseman they've lacked. They can pair him with Rielly and have one of the best top-pairings in hockey. They don't even have a top pairing right now, so it can't be overstated how much of a major impact this move would have.
Tanev and McCabe can then be 20x more effective by being a proper shut-down pair who don't have to worry about how their offensive inability is hurting the team.
OEL would slide to the 3rd pairing and suddenly the Leafs look way more like a Cup threat because now they can move the puck with every pairing, and more importantly, Simon Benoit never has to dress again.
Dobson is elite offensively and not far off being elite defensively. He's only 25 and has the same cap hit as Max Domi (or at least close enough). The Leafs need to go all-in and that means paying whatever it costs to pick up Noah Dobson.
It's the only way they can win the Stanley Cup because there isn't another elite defenseman with such a small cap hit.