Toronto Maple Leafs centre Auston Matthews celebrates with teammates on the bench after his goal tied the game against the Boston Bruins late in the third period at TD Garden in Boston on Oct. 26.Winslow Townson/Reuters
Thirty-one years ago, the holy Leafs of St. Patrick and St. Dougie almost made it through the first month without losing a game. Ten wins in a row to start the season. It’s still a record for a Canadian NHL team.
One local scalper said at the time that the just-getting-going Maple Leafs were a hotter ticket than baseball’s repeat world champions.
“[Fans] were all buying hockey, but down there on the street for the Jays, nothing,” the tout told the Kitchener-Waterloo Record.
Anywhere else, you’d say that had to be hyperbole. But in Toronto? It’s possible.
Of course, it didn’t work out. The Leafs were T-boned by the Vancouver Canucks in the conference final. Shortly thereafter, another golden generation was sent to the taxidermist for stuffing.
But the memory of that start lingers. Just about every year since then has been the Leafs’ year, until they started it.
Last year was their year (actual start: 5-6). And the year before (actual start: 4-6). And the year before (actual start: 2-5).
The Leafs are famously bad finishers, but to be fair to them they are equally terrible beginners. They’re at it again – 4-5 after nine games, three losses in a row, a power play that’s more like a five-man brownout.
New head coach Craig Berube never looks happy, which is great for working in Toronto because it’s so much harder to tell when he’s enraged. But when he gave Auston Matthews the hair dryer treatment on the bench the other night, you knew. The city is already getting to him. The ‘new ideas/new era’ gloss is already off these Leafs.
But don’t worry. Things can get worse.
On Monday, the Leafs will play Winnipeg in Manitoba. Two weeks ago, this didn’t look like much of a game. Now it’s an opportunity for the Jets to absorb what little remains of the Leafs’ off-season mojo.
In a lot of ways, the Jets are the Leafs and vice versa. Same built-for-right-now roster. Same local expectations. The only difference is how much they can charge for luxury boxes.
The Jets’ core – Mark Scheifele, Kyle Connor, Josh Morrissey, goalie Connor Hellebuyck – are all around 30. That’s not too old, but the peak of the performance mountain is visible. All their high-end talent took a week-long working vacation last April, turning what had been a great season into a shambles.
Like the Leafs, the Jets changed the one thing Canadian hockey teams have the courage to change – their head coach. Like the Leafs, they’ve promised a new approach. Unlike the Leafs, they’ve done that. The Jets are 8-0.
Winnipeg Jets defenseman Dylan Samberg celebrates his goal with teammates against the Calgary Flames during the third period at Scotiabank Saddledome in Calgary on Oct. 26.Sergei Belski/Reuters
These games have not been squeakers. Riding the best power play in the NHL, the Jets are laying down nightly beatings. All that offence is bookended by the league’s least-porous defence.
The difference isn’t just a new scheme or Hellebuyck on a heater. It’s that, from the off, the Jets have played heavy. They look like a bunch of guys aware of how foolish they looked six months ago, who feel the need to change that impression.
Saturday night’s game in Calgary was the most impressive of the lot. It was the third game of an early road swing, and one against a rival. A classic letdown game.
Late in the third, tied 3-3, the Jets went on a two-man advantage. No joy. That’s where it should have tipped over. Instead, an ill-timed Nazem Kadri slash – remember those? – became another Winnipeg power play, became the winning goal. The run continues.
Long winning streaks aren’t great predictors of results. Over the course of NHL history, a dozen teams have won at least 13 games in a row. Only one of those (the 1981-82 New York Islanders) went on to win a Stanley Cup.
Every night, a good NHL roster is about 50-50 to win. Winning 10 in a row doesn’t mean you’re better than everyone else. It means you came out with sevens a bunch of times. It’s luck.
But it’s the sort of luck that can shape reality. Good teams win regularly because a) they think they will and, more important, b) their opponents think they will, too.
No matter how long the Winnipeg Jets streak continues, they won’t have proved anything about their playoff capabilities. But it’s possible that they will have proved to each other that they can win when they want to. It helps to do this at the start of the year, before bad mental habits can form.
Meanwhile, the Leafs are proving the opposite to themselves. Whenever one of them comes out and delivers their weary line about long seasons and things working themselves out, what is that but someone explaining to you why they don’t expect to win?
They’re doing the right thing and getting the wrong result. That’s what the Leafs keep saying, as though it’s an explanation. But that’s not a hopeful idea. It’s a hopeless one. It’s the kind that repeats on a loop when the games start to matter.
For the sake of the headline, you’d like to be able to say the Leafs have to win on Monday night. If only to prove to themselves that they are not already trailing the leading pack by a distance.
But that’s not true, because you only get one shot to come steaming out of the gate. The Leafs snagged a pants pocket on the gate latch.
As a result, the next six months will be one long rearguard action. Unlike that version 31 years ago, these Leafs have never believed in themselves, and it’s too late to start now.
Over on the other side, the Jets have created new hope where there was no compelling reason to believe it should exist. Same guys, new team. The big question for next April – will these same Jets feel different then too?
