The Toronto Maple Leafs have shockingly played their best hockey of the season to date in their past three games. Coincidentally, Captain Auston Matthews was injured for these three games. If you’re a Leafs fan, this is hardly surprising. It seems like whenever Matthews has any sort of minor ailment that causes him to miss time, the team as a whole steps up and plays some good hockey. Jokes are then made online about how the Leafs would be better off trading Matthews, rinse and repeat.
Overall, it’s a good thing that the team can step up in Matthews’ absence and it’s good to know that the team isn’t completely hopeless if they’re without their best player. The problem is that, in the past, they’ve reverted back to old habits upon his return and wonder why they weren’t able to maintain the strong play from before. While Matthews’ status for Tuesday night’s contest against the Ottawa Senators is uncertain erring on the side of unavailable, there’s a clear message that head coach Craig Berube needs to instill in his team when his star centre returns, and that message is simple — don’t change anything.
MITCH MARNER 🚨
The power play keeps going pic.twitter.com/MDZOulnVY2
— Omar (@TicTacTOmar) November 9, 2024
This message applies to special teams more than anything else. The Maple Leafs’ lackadaisical power play had been a talking point to start the season, going a lifeless 4-for-40 in the team’s first 13 games of the season and sitting dead last in the NHL at one point. In the past three games, since Matthews has been out, they’ve scored seven power play goals on 13 opportunities, catapulting their power play from 32nd up to 14th in the NHL. And do you know why? Because they’re embracing the simplicity of their game plan and not trying to funnel each and every play through Matthews.
I get it, it’s tempting when you have arguably the best goal-scorer since Alex Ovechkin to try and feed him the puck. But the Leafs seem to forget that they have two 90+ point wingers and a veteran capable of 70 points who can help, too. Mitch Marner has six points in three games without Matthews, Nylander has five, and Tavares has three. Morgan Rielly, who has quarterbacked the top power-play unit for most of the season (and most of his career as a Leaf) has five points in those three games. The reason they’ve been so successful is that they’re letting their skills dictate the outcome instead of trying to force plays. Everybody is taking shots on net and they seem to have put an extra emphasis on getting rebounds, and with no designated trigger man, it’s forced defenders to stay on their toes knowing that each player on the ice is capable of doing damage. That’s no different when Matthews is in the lineup, but when you keep sending the puck to one player, it’s easier for the opponents to adapt and cover them, yet the rest of the team continues to try and force it to him.
JOHN TAVARES 🚨
The power play is in can’t miss mode! pic.twitter.com/Tanp7wqtxp
— Omar (@TicTacTOmar) November 10, 2024
As we’ve learned in the past (on what seems to be an annual basis around late April/early May), the Maple Leafs power play can be rendered useless if you can shut down their game plan. If Matthews isn’t getting clean looks, it seems to be an endless cycle of perimeter play and a game of hot potato between the point and the boards. The opponent clears the puck, they attempt the slingshot-style zone entry, sometimes it works, sometimes not. But more often than not, the power play turns into a rinse-and-repeat cycle of trying to get set up, getting smothered, and regrouping. They can keep their positive momentum up if they stick to their game plan from the past three games, and dare I say improve even more. There should never be a situation where adding a 69-goal scorer to your man advantage is a bad thing, and the Leafs can get even better if they simply stick to what’s worked.
This isn’t to say that it was Sheldon Keefe’s fault that the Leafs’ power play always dried up at the end of the year. But at the same time, the fresh start with a new name behind the bench has extended the leash on a lot of these issues. Everybody got so used to seeing how a Sheldon Keefe-led hockey team performed on a day-to-day basis, how they adapted to certain situations, and what they would do when things stopped working. While Keefe’s teams were traditionally good at making sure scoring goals wasn’t often a talking point, at least during the season, it’s fair to acknowledge that the team was never able to win more than one playoff round while he was behind the bench, and that was in large part due to their inability to score on the power play when the playoffs started. We’ll see if Berube can get this message through to his guys.
