Same Old Story: Toronto Maple Leafs Lose Another Game 7

Whether it was Game 5 in the bubble against the Columbus Blue Jackets, which had a Game 7 feel or Game 7 itself, this group does not have the clutch gene to get over the hump. At some point, enough was enough; there needed to be a change in the makeup of this group.

Everyone always points to goaltending and defense as the problem, and when you give up six goals, it is easy to say that. But the entire team underperformed. The Maple Leafs are offensively challenged when the game or season is on the line.

The Maple Leafs have scored five goals in the past six winner-take-all games. They have just scored one goal in each of those games. So where is the offense? Toronto has talented players such as William Nylander, Mitch Marner, John Tavares, and Auston Matthews. But these guys are invisible in those moments outside of last year, when they lost to Boston by a score of 2-1 in overtime.

To make matters worse, according to Sportsnet Stats, the “Core Four or Five” have combined for three goals in those losses.

It is just not about depth scoring. When it matters most, the Toronto Maple Leafs’ big guys do not deliver. It is not in their DNA or makeup to step up when the lights shine the brightest. Something had to change a long time ago, but it did not.

Toronto Maple Leafs: Toronto Maple Leafs Continue To Fold Under the Pressure

Winnipeg Jets: Winnipeg Jets Have Issues Winning on the Road in the Playoffs

Carolina Hurricanes: Andrei Svechnikov Delivering for the Carolina Hurricanes

Dallas Stars: Mikko Rantanen Coming Up Clutch in the Stanley Cup Playoffs

You can bring in a new coach and a new general manager and fix the group’s aesthetics. However, it still comes down to what your top players do in the playoffs. That is how winning is done. Look around at the past Stanley Cup Champions, from the Floridas to the Tampa Bays, to the St. Louis’s, to the Vegas’s of the world. Yeah, they had role players, but the top players stepped up and delivered when it mattered most.

However, as Full Press Hockey wrote last week before Game 6, maybe some of these playoffs are not built to play in the playoffs. As Billie Jean King said, “Pressure is Privilege,” and this group can’t handle the pressure of the Stanley Cup Playoffs.

It was easy to say run in back after 2017-2020, but after 2021, there was no excuse not to change the makeup of this group. Everyone within the organization thought this group could get it done. It was just not in the DNA to do it.

Right now, it is all mental with them. However, the narrative had to change at some point, and it did not happen in Toronto. The players thought they knew best, and the team paid for it. There was not enough buy-in and show of competitiveness to win in the biggest games of the year.

No team should be outscored 12-2 in the final two games on home ice in a series. Not to mention, they were outscored 18-11 on home ice since the end of period 1 in Game 1 of Round 2. If you go back to Game 5 of Round 1 against the Ottawa Senators, where the Maple Leafs lost 4-0, Toronto has been outscored 22-11 on home ice in the last five home playoff games.

Remember the Maple Leafs won the first two games on home ice and had a chance to go up 3-0 on the champs in Game 3. Unfortunately, that is where the series changed as they could not get the goal late in period 3 or overtime. The ultimate Maple Leafs killer, Brad Marchand, won Game 3 in overtime, and the Panthers never looked back.

He contributed to the Leafs’ failures in Game 7. Marchand is 5-0 against Toronto in Game 7 and 4-0 against this team’s core four. On Sunday night, he had another three-point performance against the Maple Leafs in the Panthers’ victory.

As Morgan Rielly said a year ago, “We are not close to winning,” which could not be more true. They aren’t. Toronto has to decide what the future holds for them because, top to bottom, there needs to be change, as the definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again.

These players accepted losing in the playoffs. This group showed they do not have what it takes to go the extra mile to win that final game. Instead of showing they were a different team, the Maple Leafs showed they were who we thought they were: a team that can’t get it done when it matters most.

Whatever happens this offseason, it is the end of an era for this group of Maple Leafs players in Toronto. After another disappointing loss in Game 7, it showed once again that hard work beats talent when talent does not work hard.