Craig Berube confirms Maple Leafs will not add a new assistant captain to replace Marner

Like it or not, Mitch Marner’s departure leaves an absence on the Toronto Maple Leafs.

Namely, Marner served as assistant captain for six seasons in a leadership group including John Tavares, Auston Matthews, and Morgan Rielly (Zach Hyman and Jake Muzzin were briefly alternate captains for the 2020-21 season). Now with Marner gone, head coach Craig Berube confirmed that he won’t be assigning anyone else the ‘A’ this season.

“We thought about that and discussed it. I think we leave the A’s with Morgan and JT,” Berube said, speaking with The Athletic. “But our leadership group is more than that, and that’s what matters for me. You don’t have to have an A on or anything like that to be a leader. We have our leadership group and that group’s strong, and I think all the guys understand that. I think we’ll just leave the A’s with Morgan and JT right now. Whether that changes or not, it could. But right now, it’s not.”

Beyond his part in Toronto’s leadership group, Marner was also consistently a team leader in points and minutes. Berube conceded that his departure leaves a void in the team, but said they’re feeling confident in the players they’ve brought in this summer to fill the gap.

“Listen, he touched all areas of the game for us — penalty kill, power play, five on five,” Berube said. “He’s a guy that’s hard to replace. You’re not replacing him. But we brought in three new players — Roy, Joshua and Maccelli, all sorta different types of players — but I feel like we’re probably a deeper team, bringing in the three guys. We talk about replacing Mitch; that’s not what we’re trying to do. We’re just trying to improve our team in other ways by adding these players.”

Nicolas Roy was dealt to the Maple Leafs as part of the Marner sign-and-trade, while Dakota Joshua and Matias Maccelli were traded from the Vancouver Canucks and Utah Hockey Club, respectively, in exchange for a middle draft pick each. Berube said that not only do the three players make the roster deeper, but they also play the tougher brand of hockey he wants the Leafs to bring.

“They’re definitely those types of players,” Berube said. “They’re big and heavy, and they’re long and they’re defensively responsible. They’re heavy on pucks and on the forecheck and things like that. A little more size there. A guy like Maccelli’s coming in, this guy has a lot of ability making plays — he’s a good playmaker. I know he had the couple really good years in, I guess it would have been Arizona, before Utah. But we’re gonna need that offence from him and that playmaking ability, too. I feel like we added size to our team and some heaviness, but also we added a pretty good playmaker that has some real upside.”

With an even bigger, more physical look this season, the Berube style of hockey will be in full-force this season. While Marner’s absence may be felt here and there through the regular season, the playoffs will be the big test to see if it pays off, trading his mediocre postseason numbers for a tougher, deeper roster.