Craig Berube’s time with Maple Leafs parallels his post-Cup Blues seasons

It’s safe to say that Craig Berube caught lightning in a bottle during the 2018-19 season. The Blues were a talented team that was underperforming and needed someone to come in and point them in the right direction. Having a future Hall of Fame defenceman in Alex Pietrangelo didn’t hurt either. In fact, a comically deep blue line and team lousy with two-way talented top six forwards, along with emerging youthful talent like Robert Thomas and Jordan Kyrou, was a blessing. And that’s before even discussing the unsustainably great rookie campaign from Jordan Binnington.

Berube does deserve credit for righting the ship after Mike Yeo’s 7-9-3 start to the season (which coincidentally isn’t that far off Berube’s 8-9-2 start this year) and he followed up the cup championship season with a strong COVID shortened 2019-20 season as well, winning the Central Division.

The next season, the 56-game COVID follow up season, is the one that seems to mirror what the Leafs are experiencing with Berube this year. This was the first season after Alex Pietrangelo left for Vegas (not entirely different than losing Mitch Marner to Vegas, but you could argue that having Pietrangelo walk is even more impactful), and the Blues were attempting to replace Pietrangelo with Torey Krug. You can’t hang that on Craig Berube just like you can’t hang Dakota Joshua, Nicolas Roy, and Matias Maccelli on Berube as Marner replacements, but the Blues took a big step back and barely made the playoffs. That path seems similar to the one the Leafs are on.

The similarities don’t end there and a 2020-21 report card on Berube that season offers up some similar assessments to 2025-26 Maple Leafs:

“[Berube] encourages his players to move the puck around until they find ideal shooting lanes, rather than focusing on getting pucks on net and hoping for fortunate bounces. In other words, Berube desires shot quality over shot quality. But in this season, he ended up getting neither.”

This assessment from 2020-21 tracks with the 2025-26 Maple Leafs and the previous season as well. When looking at the Maple Leafs shot differentials getting worse, it’s not from the team allowing more shots, they are in fact allowing the pretty much the same volume they did under Sheldon Keefe, the Maple Leafs are just shooting a lot less and in looking for the perfect shot, the team is overthinking and under delivering on their biggest strength, which should be offence.

The strategy to look for the perfect opportunity isn’t bad when you have Auston Matthews, William Nylander, or John Tavares on the ice, but most of the forward group needs to rely on volume and aren’t offensively gifted enough to establish a high pressure offensive zone cycle. The Blues were exposed when losing Pietrangelo from that cycle in St. Louis, and the Leafs are likely experiencing the same drawback with Marner absent in Toronto.

“The Blues simply did not perform in the second period. It became a bugaboo that plagued their entire season, and Berube never seemed to have answers. Opponents outscored St. Louis 63-52 throughout the regular season and 7-4 in the four-game playoff series against Colorado”

The Leafs have an even goal differential in the first period and have a +4 goal differential in the third period. The period that is sinking the Leafs right now is the second period where they have been outscored 28-19.

What could be leading to this issue? The long change is the significant difference in the second and with the Leafs being an older (and slower) team, there is a greater chance of getting caught on a change creating an odd man rush or there is a greater potential for players you don’t want on the ice in a defensive zone situation getting stuck out there for longer shifts. The Leafs not having Marner as defensively minded presence who is on the ice against top lines could be impactful as well, and certainly for the Blues the lack of Pietrangelo would have exposed their team more in the second period.

“Berube remains focused on the kind of forechecking and heavy, plodding, defensive hockey that helped the Blues win the Stanley Cup in 2019.”

The context for the above quote is that Berube had a misaligned vision with Doug Armstrong, who was bringing in players to play a faster, transitional style of hockey. There isn’t that misalignment with Brad Treliving, who seems to be on the same page as Berube, but the question remains whether the style of hockey that Berube wants his team playing is the right call.

“The coach’s squad was completely outmatched in the playoffs, and the coach didn’t seem to have any answers. Few would deny that Berube is more of a “motivational” or “player’s coach” than a strategist, but this season, it seems that message fell on deaf ears.”

The final summary of the report card on Berube in 2020-21 goes on to state that if he has lost the room it’s possible he won’t be long for the Blues. What ended up happening is a strong bounce back year in 2021-22, before Berube’s results fizzling in 2022-23 and ultimately seeing him relieved of duties in early 2023-24. Berube had a 13-14-1 start to the 2023-24 season and Berube’s replacement, Drew Bannister, managed a 30-19-5 record with that group after Berube’s departure.

The motivational, light on direction approach hasn’t generally done well in Toronto but there is also something to be said for where the roster is missing the mark compared to what worked for Berube in the past. Ryan O’Reilly, Brayden Schenn, and Alex Steen was a pretty elite group of two-way players back in 2018-19, and while most people would easily take Matthews, Tavares, and Roy or Scott Laughton as suitable replacements, that group might have been the better fit for Berube.

There’s also something to be said for the Blues defence and how even in the post Pietrangelo years in St. Louis, the Maple Leafs do not have the personnel that can sit back the have the game come to them the way Berube had the Blues play.

Much like the assessment from 2020-21, there should be a concern in Toronto that Berube can’t adapt to the personnel he has to work with and there isn’t an attempt to adapt to how their opponents are playing them or more importantly, much of attempt to force the opposition to respond to the Leafs.

The saving grace for Berube might end up being goaltending, as it often is most coaches. As Jordan Binnington declined, so did Craig Berube’s reputation in St. Louis. And while Binnington continued to decline in 2021-22, Berube benefited from Ville Husso having a strong season and getting the team back on track. With Anthony Stolarz struggling this season, it could be Joseph Woll that gets Berube through this season with the Maple Leafs.

The point of this comparison is to essentially that NHL coaches have a shelf life with teams. Coaches might get a little longer once they’ve won with the core or at least have a strong buy-in from that core group and I’m not sure you can make a case that Matthews, Nylander, Tavares, or really anyone on the Leafs is fully bought into Craig Berube. That is the biggest difference between the Blues and the Leafs. If Berube can’t find results quickly with the Maple Leafs there isn’t any history to show that things could get better.