How William Villeneuve has been able to work his way up the Maple Leafs’ depth chart

The Toronto Maple Leafs announced the signing of defenceman William Villeneuve to a one-year contract extension on Tuesday, bringing back one of their top defensive prospects after a solid breakout year with the Toronto Marlies with an opportunity to maybe secure that ever-so coveted NHL debut in 2025-26.

Calling Villeneuve one of the team’s top defensive prospects is, on one hand, a nod to his development over the past few seasons, and on the other hand, an indictment of how weak the Leafs’ prospect pool is. Still, it’s not Villeneuve’s fault that the team has traded a good number of draft picks in recent years and had a couple of draft classes full of whiffs back a half-decade ago or so. In fact, the Quebecois blueliner was a member of one of those draft classes. A right-handed defenceman standing at 6-foot-2 and 183 pounds, he was a fourth-round pick of the Maple Leafs in the 2020 NHL Draft after a solid sophomore season with the QMJHL’s Saint-John Sea Dogs that saw him display some offensive potential, with 58 points in 64 games.

These kinds of numbers offensively are always worth an extended look, but in the two years that followed, Topi Niemela emerged as the clear shiny toy from the 2020 draft class and the Maple Leafs’ top defensive prospect. While Niemela had a breakout season two years after hearing his name called, Villeneuve had just wrapped up his final junior season that saw him finish with 56 points, less than what he had in his draft season. Usually, seeing your numbers dwindle as you get older is a recipe to not earning a contract, but the Maple Leafs kept the faith and signed him to an entry-level deal.

In his first two AHL seasons, the 23-year-old focused on honing his skills on the defensive side of the game. This is imperative for any young defenceman with an offensive-heavy game, and while his numbers in his first two seasons as a Marlie didn’t jump off the plate, it was an indicator that his focus was elsewhere. Hilariously enough, Villeneuve’s first two seasons with the Marlies were the exact same. He had 25 points in 54 games both years, the only difference being he had an extra goal in 2022-23 and one less assist, and vice versa in 2023-24.

The 2024-25 season is when he broke out, with 40 points in 55 games, and he also tallied two assists in two playoff games. With Niemela having signed in Europe this season, the door has officially opened for Villeneuve to be one of the Maple Leafs’ first callup options should they suffer any injuries on the defensive corps. The work on his defensive game is going to be what gets him that opportunity, as the Leafs have shown the tendency to give first dibs to prospects who they can trust if they have to throw them out against another team’s top line, and sometimes they’re thrown right into the fire on the penalty kill.

Calling up Villeneuve doesn’t mean that he will jump into the lineup and immediately start taking penalty kill reps on the team’s top unit, but if nothing else, it will make the Maple Leafs feel better to know that they won’t necessarily need to pair him with a babysitter to trust him on the ice. And who knows what happens from there? He could see himself get an opportunity to quarterback the power play, which he’ll be getting regular opportunities to do with the Marlies this season, and if the Leafs like what they see, it could bridge the gap to a potential full-time NHL job, or if they determine that they don’t have the room for him, he could be used as a trade chip at the deadline.

We’re getting extremely ahead of ourselves here, but the point is that Villeneuve has shown the ability to adapt his game to different situations, and with no immediate pressure to jump into an NHL role, he can continue to work on those defensive skills and lean on his offence to get eyes on him. The drawback here is that the regime that drafted him is no longer here, so he won’t have the advantage of knowing his general manager from the start, meaning there’s less attachment between personnel and player. But, that won’t matter if Villeneuve continues to improve each year and show the current brass that he’s worthy of being a piece worth holding onto.