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Papi Auston Matthews 2025-26 Point Projection for the Toronto Maple Leafs

Originally posted on Last Word On Sports | By Levi Pike | Last updated Sep 6, 2025 10:47 AM ET

Ah, yes, it is time for Auston Matthews 2025-26 NHL player point projection. For a quiet Saturday morning in September, the sun, the shades, the training camps. Let’s get it. Papi will have a big 2025-26 season, and is preparing for it already, you know it. Olympic orientation camps are quite spectacular, and do wonders for a players’ mentality. Now, he has his eyes set on Stanley Cup glory for the Toronto Maple Leafs, along with Olympic Gold aspirations.

Auston Matthews 2025-26 Point Projection

The nice thing about the Leaf forwards this year, as they will all see a point injection. Losing Mitch Marner is John Tavares, William Nylander, and of course, Matthews collective advantage. It will naturally cause a shift in the offence as a way of compensating for the loss of a 100-point getter. Now, there is some question in whether or not the Leafs will have enough offence. But we are here to tell you, they will have the offence. Make no mistake.

Okay, as a Leaf fan, you’ll know what I am about to tell you. The Leafs, and hence, Auston Matthews, are loaded with two-way, defensive players. Guys like Matias Maccelli and Max Domi might be considered exceptions. However, that concentration of your style of play to expend energy defending your own end, can make it hard to snipe and have enough energy left on the offensive side of the puck. Hence, is the case with Auston Matthews. You are more concerned with keeping the puck out of your net, hmmm, Aleksander Barkov spice.

One thing is to think about, is that Matthews no longer has Marner distributing the puck. Conversely, Matthews still has his release, his consistency, he puck control, and oh yeah, he’s the captain of the Toronto Maple Leafs. Not a big deal! In any case, given Matthews’ elite level of talent, he should be able to find a way to succeed.

Look at his last six NHL seasons in the graphic below, courtesy of hockey-reference.com.

In years that Matthews played 75-or-more games, you can reasonably develop a model of consistency. Plus, it does feel like he will be motivated to prove that he is an elite, all-time goal scorer. Not unlike Alex Ovechkin throughout his illustrious NHL career to this point. For Ovi, including of course a Stanley Cup Championship to go along with the all-time goal-scoring record. He is a great example of someone, who no matter the circumstances, has always been able to score a lot of goals.

Time for his Goal Prediction

Matthews will be between 47-and-52 goals in 2025-26 we think. He’s hard to slow down for opposition defences. Plus, he will be all around the net generating offence, in order start with some offensive boosts, as he’s known to possess.

Playing with guys like Nylander, Matthew Knies, and even John Tavares on the power play in particular, we help him generate offence in a well-rounded fashion. He will have plenty of options to get assists with his stickhandling downlow and his ability to adapt to defences and attack with efficiency. A career 15.8 shooting percentage will back up defenders to try to shut down his accurate shots and help out their goaltender.

With all the open space that Matthews creates, it seems he is pretty consistently between 40-and-45 assists in a season. This will depend on his ability to approach a full 82-game slate.

It is a Team Game and that’s a Good Thing, Strength in Numbers

For the Leafs, it does really depend on how their team gels as a whole. If they can stay healthy, and their new players can integrate into roles with the club, they will undoubtedly be successful.

It is somewhat surprising that main sportsbooks have Matthews’ over/under for points at 89.5. You’d think someone that could score 60 goals would end up with more total points. However, it is possible for Matthews to get 60 goals and 30 assists would be a counter-argument.

Realistic? About as realistic as a 60-goal season. Achievable, well our point projection has him under. In both goals and total points. We think that Matthews can hit 90, if he is right at his norm.

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This article first appeared on Last Word On Sports and was syndicated with permission.

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