The Toronto Maple Leafs are headed to the playoffs for the ninth time in a row, a fact that, had you told yourself that in 2016, you probably would have been pretty elated to hear. The elephant in the room there is the whole ‘one series win during that time’ thing, as we all know, but Year 9 of this production is shaping up to be one of the most exciting. The Battle of Ontario will return for the first time since 2003-04, with a first-round tilt against the Ottawa Senators, who are out to prove themselves after a lengthy break since their last playoff appearance.

While the past three years have seen a regular season that boils down to “will it be Tampa Bay or Boston?” by the time December rolls around, the race was wide open right until the final buzzer in 2024-25. The Leafs won the Atlantic Division for the first time in the Auston Matthews era, and earned themselves a shot against a provincial rival that spawned some of the team’s fondest playoff memories. They especially turned it on in the final stretch of the season, finishing the season 13-2-1 in their final 16 games with a five-game winning streak going into the playoffs.

The Leafs did this despite concerns all year long that their play wasn’t sustainable, even if their place in the standings reflected otherwise. At 5-on-5, the first edition of a Brad Treliving/Craig Berube hockey team saw them place 12th in the league in goals-for, 29th in the league in CF% (Corsi-for), 24th in the league in xG% (expected-goals), and 23rd in the league in SCF% (scoring chances-for). Their poor underlyings from a puck possession standpoint are exactly what everybody feared would happen under Berube – another conflict in vision between the high-skill, speed-driven players on the team and the coach, a la Mike Babcock in 2019-20.

And yet, they finished first place in the Atlantic Division despite all of this. How?

For one, the emphasis on building a structured defensive corps was clear from the get-go. Chris Tanev was his biggest signing of the offseason, and he became the team’s franchise leader in blocked shots this season. He and Jake McCabe have formed the best shutdown pairing this team has had in the current era, eating up 622 minutes of ice time together and playing to a 62.00% GF% (goals-for).

Oliver Ekman-Larsson, also signed to a multi-year contract this past offseason, has been sturdy and shown ability to eat up minutes when necessary, and with the deadline having passed, will be able to play in a lesser role, which was likely the plan the whole time. That deadline featured the buzzer-beater addition of Brandon Carlo from the Boston Bruins, who has given Morgan Rielly a consistent defensive partner that he can develop chemistry with. He fits the bill of a big, strong, right-handed defenceman, but one that can also make a breakout pass, unlike the Ilya Lyubushkins and Joel Edmundsons of last season.

The goaltending also can’t be ignored. Joseph Woll showed enough last season to earn his three-year extension, which takes effect next season, and while Anthony Stolarz had his skeptics due to the lack of experience, he turned it into a Vezina-calibre first season as a 1A starter. They got about as close to the Jeremy Swayman-Linus Ullmark tandem the Bruins boasted as you can, and they have the Leafs in a position where they feel like they have a chance to win regardless of who’s in net.

Oh, and Mitch Marner securing his first-ever 100-point season helps, too. That’s a clear indicator that Berube’s system didn’t suffocate them even if it wasn’t the ‘run-and-gun’ style offence they were used to under Sheldon Keefe. The 2021-22 Maple Leafs finished second in the league in goals, 6th in the league in CF%, and 3rd in the league in xG%. Where did that get them? Seven games into the playoffs with a ticket home punched by Nick Paul, of all people.

Auston Matthews himself credited Berube’s style of coaching to their success this season.

“ I think we’re playing much more direct,” Matthews said. “ I wouldn’t say this style has changed dramatically, but I definitely think there’s certain areas in certain parts of the game that we’ve keyed on, tried to be better in, and made more of an emphasis on.  Just playing more direct, physical.  With personnel changes, sometimes style of play changes a little bit too. But I think all in all, it’s pretty positive.”

Another area they were extremely successful in was their record in one-goal games. Everybody talks about how the ice shrinks in the playoffs, and how tight the games become, and it seems as though the Leafs are preparing for that. They finished the season 23-4-4 in one-goal games many of which they were outshot in. So how did they manage to come out on top so much? The answer is that it’s hockey. They simply found a way, and oftentimes that’s all that’s required.

If there’s one qualm to be had with this team at the moment, it’s the special teams. They scored one single power play goal in last year’s playoffs, and for a team that’s built around four star forwards up front, that’s simply not good enough. The Leafs’ power play caught fire in March but slowed down again in April, closing out the season with a 1-for-16 streak, and their penalty kill is third-worst in the NHL going back to March 1. The Leafs will need to find a way to win the special teams battle if they want to make a meaningful run, and while the performance of late is concerning, all they need to do is pull it together for one game, every game. If they flounder one night, figure it out and pull it together the next night. The sample sizes from this past season won’t matter if they can improve on it.

The point of this essay is not to discredit analytics in any way. They have always been a useful tool for evaluating teams and players, and that’s all they should be. The point, rather, is to show that having the strongest possession numbers during the regular season and scoring goals in bunches doesn’t always mean you’re going to get the same thing in the playoffs. The Kyle Dubas/Sheldon Keefe teams always had juggernaut regular seasons that made you believe nobody could stop them. And those narratives were silenced within seven games every year besides 2022-23, when that number was raised to 11 games.

Whether a Treliving/Berube coded team is more built for the playoffs remains to be seen. And, as always, how they fare in the postseason will ultimately come down to how much the top guns contribute, whether they win the special teams battle, and whether they get the timely save or not. But, for right now, it’s fair to say that winning the strong regular season underlying numbers award hasn’t saved them in the past, and the current iteration of the Leafs deserve a chance to prove us wrong in the playoffs, just like they did all season long.