It’s gotten to the point where we can go into our mental rolodex and pull out some old snippets of criticism of the Toronto Maple Leafs, such as the old Dennis Green ‘they are what we thought they were’ line, but fans of the Leafs hoped that all the changes made last summer and before the trade deadline would bring about a different result.
Nope!
A blow-by-blow analysis of the 6-1 thrashing at the hands of the Florida Panthers is not necessary, because we have now grown used to seeing the Leafs completely collapse and fold up like a cheap suit. Their inability to rise to the occasion has been on display since 2018. The only difference on Wednesday night was that this was not the series’ deciding game, but it might as well have been.
As they did in Game 2 and Game 4, Toronto began the game with no urgency when most other teams would be playing with their hair on fire. In consecutive games, goaltender Joseph Woll was the best player on the ice wearing Blue and White in the opening 20 minutes. On Wednesday, the Leafs goalie made 12 saves, allowing only an Aaron Ekblad shot to get by him.
“We just played slow,” Leafs head coach Craig Berube said. “(The Panthers) were fast, they were on us, they were hungrier. That was the first period, and that set the tone for the game.”
Toronto made a push early in the second, but Dmitri Kulikov’s shot that deflected off of Scott Laughton’s stick knocked all of the fight out of the emotionally fragile Leafs. They allowed two more in the middle frame and a pair of goals in the third before Nick Robertson snapped Sergei Bobrovsky’s shutout bid.
The Leafs performance was so dismal that the fans began booing Auston Matthews and Mitch Marner near the end of the second period, a Matthews jersey was thrown on the ice, Panthers forwards Brad Marchand and Matthew Tkachuk started openly laughing at their opponent, and fans began filing out of Scotiabank Arena with most of the third period remaining.
Berube tried to downplay the performance after the game, saying the club made mistakes and that everyone had to be better, but once again, the onus has to fall on the Leafs core group and how they once again pulled a disappearing act when adversity set in. Marner’s spin-o-rama pass that led to Jesper Boqvist’s goal was symbolic of how the top line was systematically outplayed (a collective -7 in the game) and what made it worse was Florida’s big guns were mostly silent, as half the goals came from Panthers blueliners, and two others from players who play mostly fourth line.
In spite of three coaching changes, three general managers, numerous defensemen, goaltenders, and secondary players, one thing has been remained the same since the summer of 2018, and once again, the Maple Leafs are one loss away from another woeful and disappointing end and another offseason full of recriminations.
