With just seven games remaining in the season, the Maple Leafs head into Saturday night’s game against the Blue Jackets with a three point cushion at the top of the Atlantic. It’s a nice little cushion to have but with back-to-back games against the Panthers and Lightning in the next week, it will take some effort to protect.

The Maple Leafs will have no bigger fans in their effort to win the division than the NHL’s marketing department. Being able to start off round one of the playoffs with the Battle of Ontario and the Battle of Florida is some consolation when the go-to American markets of Chicago, Boston, New York, and Philadelphia will potentially all be absent (though the Rangers aren’t licked yet.)

Here are some other stray thoughts on the Leafs as we inch towards the most important hockey of the year…

This might be overstating the obvious but it is also a far cry from the combative nature that Marner has generally taken when discussing his past playoff performances.

Last spring, Marner put up just three points in seven games, easily his worst playoff performance of his career after having two statistically decent playoff runs that preceded it, albeit those seasons also drew criticism for lack of consistency. Last year’s Mitch Marner was a disaster and at a time when Auston Matthews and William Nylander were both dealing with injuries and illness, Marner needed to step up. He did not.

Matthews is also not immune from criticism. He had just one goal in five games last playoffs and while he has been somewhat just below his regular season production, the idea that he has a next gear that can be reached in the playoffs hasn’t been achieved and from an eye test perspective, neither Matthews or Marner have truly taken over a game and dominated the way that we’ve seen other star players like Connor McDavid, Leon Draisaitl, Nathan MacKinnon, or Nikita Kucherov do in recent playoff seasons.

I’d argue a lot of that can be attached to Sheldon Keefe’s attempts at playoff strategy but also don’t necessarily believe that Craig Berube is a coach who is going to demand less of a two-way game out of his stars and encourage them to dominate offensively rather than play a safe all-zone game.

Expecting Matthews and Marner to be McDavid and put up 42 points in 25 games over the playoffs is asking too much. No one is Connor McDavid. Asking them for a 31-point in 25-game stretch is far more reasonable and is also in-line with the performances from MacKinnon and Kucherov. Projecting Marner’s 2022-23 numbers out over a full Stanley Cup run, he’s right there with MacKinnon and Kucherov and slightly below Draisaitl. As harsh as the criticism was for Marner following the 2022-23 playoffs and inconsistency in performance was a factor, now looking at a stat sheet it reflects a more aspirational target.

The role of Matthews and Marner also comes with increased difficulty on the competition they face. Line matching is much more of a thing in the playoffs and it is a lot harder to find that shift against bottom six forwards and bottom pairing defencemen. To some extent at 5v5, Matthews and Marner need to weather the storm against the best their opponents can throw at them, and Toronto needs to tap into some of the secondary scoring that hasn’t previously been available to them to make up the difference. While the Maple Leafs haven’t always shown it this year, this is the deepest offensively talented lineup Toronto has had in a long time and players like Pacioretty, Robertson, Domi, Laughton, and Jarnkrok outside of the top six forwards should either ease the burden for Matthews and Marner on the scoresheet.

Where Matthews and Marner need to answer the call is on special teams and this has been a huge shortcoming for the Leafs in the post season. The predictable zone entries of the Guy Boucher powerplays of 2023-24 have been replaced with the overly complicated strategies of Marc Savard this season. There have been signs of life on the powerplay of late and if Toronto builds off its late season success here and capitalize on their skill players ability to create instinctively, it won’t be a repeat of the last post season where Matthews and Marner combined for just one power play assist between the two of them.

Marner has shown a lot of promise this season that things could be different. He has embraced heading to different areas of the ice, has shown a willingness to be a shooting option from time to time, and on the powerplay doesn’t seem like he’s exclusively looking for how to get the puck to Matthews. This play already looks like it will yield better results for him in the playoffs.

Matthews’ hasn’t been at 100% this season but has steadily improved throughout the year. March was statistically his best month, so maybe he is getting hot at the right time.

Provided that both Matthews and Marner can hold their regular season results while playing in tougher situations, the Leafs are getting what they paid for from their two biggest stars.

Two of the biggest names in free agency this summer are Mitch Marner and John Tavares (ranked 1st and 3rd respectively on Frank Seravalli’s initial free agent list.) Likely the only thing holding Tavares back from the second spot is his age, but it is interesting to see that the best case scenario for the Maple Leafs might be once again running it back despite the fact that there will be little appetite to do so if the playoffs go sideways once again.

When looking at the potential free agent options if the Leafs move on from one or both of their stars is pretty much limited to Brock Boeser and Nik Ehlers as the still somewhat close to their prime, consistent offensive dynamos. Ivan Provorov and Aaron Ekblad are interesting defensive options as well, but that is pretty much the top tier along with the vastly underrated Neal Pionk and the next David Clarkson contract in Sam Bennett.

Free agency looks like a headache. If the Leafs are running back Marner, Tavares, and Knies, their cap space is already likely spent. If the Leafs are moving on from either Marner or Tavares, the potential to replace either in meaningful way doesn’t exist in unrestricted free agency.

I don’t buy into the fact that the NHL’s cap increase is ushering in a glorious new era where teams actually use offer sheets, and from the Leafs perspective they don’t have the resources to big players in this regard and are far more likely to be a target as teams go after Knies.

No, the benefit to the Leafs is to embrace trades and not necessarily where they are targeting specific players but instead if Toronto isn’t able to bring back Marner they position themselves as a salary dumping ground and take somewhat decent players at discounted prices. Good players have been moved this way in recent years and many have responded with better seasons than players who were chased down in free agency and given a premium. If the Leafs are potentially moving on from Marner, weaponizing the cap space with the realization that there is no true replacement available for him makes more sense than refusing to Marner $14M only to hand Sam Bennett $10M. (Okay, realistically no one is offering Sam Bennett $10M, but whatever he gets he won’t be able to live up to that deal.

When looking at Seravalli’s list of top unrestricted free agents it doesn’t take long to get into aging veterans, role players who had something clicked last season, and sheltered scorers. It’s a bad market and it’s a bad market combined with the most money GMs have had to spend in a long time. Sitting out unrestricted free agency (aside from attempting to land Marner close to the AFP projected cost of $12.6M AAV and Tavares at $8M AAV) is in Toronto’s best interest.