The Toronto Maple Leafs were a different team once Mitch Marner left for the Vegas Golden Knights, and former head coach Craig Berube believes it had drastic impacts on his team’s dressing room.

Berube was a guest recently on Rob Simpson’s ‘Simmer’s Morning Skate‘ and was asked who he felt was the emotional leader of his hockey team when he was the Maple Leafs‘ bench boss. Berube didn’t skip a beat and opened up about what Marner brought to the team, each and every day.

“Mitch Marner, for sure. I thought Mitch was the energy,” Berube stated. “He brought the energy and the emotion to the game, I thought, on a nightly basis. And, in practice. Vocal guy, chatted a lot on the bench, chatted a lot in practice. Brought the energy, when he came back to the bench, he’d let guys know to pick it up, let’s go.”

Marner was originally a 2015 first-round pick of the Maple Leafs and spent parts nine seasons in Toronto. Unfortunately, despite Marner’s energy levels and expectations of his teammates, Marner-led teams weren’t able to break through in the Stanley Cup Playoffs, and get over the hump. Marner was eventually traded in an offseason deal last summer to the Vegas Golden Knights and posted 29 points in 22 Stanley Cup Playoff games, leading the Golden Knights all the way to the Stanley Cup Final.

Berube was let go at the end of this past season, once the Leafs named John Chayka the new general manager. Berube felt his team wasn’t the same last season without Marner, which was, what he felt, was one of the many reasons the team wasn’t able to reach expectations.

“He was great, I really enjoyed coaching him. I thought we lost our emotional leader, for sure. It was a big loss, not only the player, but in the locker room, on the bench, in practices, things like that. I thought he brought that element, I thought he held guys accountable.”

With a newly constructed roster in Toronto, we now wait and see who the emotional leaders are for the 2026-27 Maple Leafs, and who speaks up to hold players accountable internally.