Nine games and counting. By next week we’ll likely be on to debating who should and shouldn’t represent their countries in the World Hockey Championship, and the topic will become how will the Toronto Marlies holdup in the AHL playoffs if they get Jacob Quillan and Easton Cowan for their run.

For now, there is still a sense of mystery about where the Maple Leafs will end up in the standings. It doesn’t seem much likely that Leafs can improve to any better than 12th from the bottom in the league but stringing together a pair of wins has made the fifth worst record a little harder to obtain, especially with the San Jose Sharks and Seattle Kraken now bottoming out. If you are on team tank, Saturday’s game against the St. Louis Blues, as well as upcoming games against the San Jose Sharks and Florida Panthers are must lose. And of the nine remaining games, the Leafs have four games against teams that are still playing for something, either important playoff seeding or attempting to climb into or clinch a playoff berth. Only the games against the Dallas Stars and Washington Capitals truly seem like going through the motion games.

The Western Conference has been overly kind to the Maple Leafs this season, so a California + Missouri road trip it seems just as likely that Leafs end the season with lower draft lottery odds and increase the likelihood of the Boston Bruins using the Maple Leafs draft pick. Despite the fact that it is most likely it will be the Bruins using that pick anyway, maybe the Leafs pushing that selection down isn’t the worst case scenario it is often portrayed as, though cope through hope has always been the strategy for dealing with the Maple Leafs.

Here are some other thoughts heading into final three weeks of the season:

On the surface there doesn’t seem to be too much work for Keith Pelley to do when it comes to determining whether or not some of the blame for the Leafs on ice failures extends to the off ice personnel. The blame directed at Brad Treliving and Craig Berube is warranted and at this point it would be puzzling to see either being retained by the Leafs in the immediate aftermath of the season. The rub is, there likely plenty of areas of concern that need to be explored and potentially a lot of things that are going right that Keith Pelley should be encouraging any incoming personnel not to ticker with too much. Steve Sullivan’s impact behind the bench brought positive outcomes to a powerplay on life support. Curtis Sanford has been successful working with the Leafs goaltenders.

It also seems unlikely the Leafs are willing to make any changes with their video guys who have prevented more goals than Leafs defence this season. Brandon Pridham, if not immediately tagged as potentially the next GM, has plenty to offer on the contract and cap management side of things, and the Player Development department has largely been a success story as well.

Other areas like pro scouting, the rest of Berube’s staff, and the Marlies off-ice personnel will require a meaningful look as to what comes next for them, again appreciating that it’s not just about getting rid of people but recognizing some people might need to be moved around or warrant bigger roles in the organization. Pelley’s work isn’t as simple as just handing out pink slips even if Leafs fans are understandably out for blood at the moment.

Pelley talking to people around the league is interesting as well. It’s hard to imagine what all is involved here and how helpful competitors will be to his process, but kudos to Pelley for attempting to be as thorough as possible, though timeliness needs to an almost equal priority for the MLSE CEO.

Losing time in the offseason potentially sinks the 2026-27 as well as players need development plans, scouts need assignments, and an understanding which of the players have firm places in the club’s future need to be established.

It is worth remembering that Pelley didn’t bring in any of these people. No one in the Leafs organization is his hire and 2025-26 was his experiment to see what Brendan Shanahan’s group would do without Shanahan. Now that he’s seen that the answer is “not much,” you can’t blame him for wanting to understand the “why” of it, you’d just be able to blame him if he continues to sit back and accept a hockey club that has been trending in the wrong direction.

Sending Bo Groulx back to the Marlies was an interesting choice by Brad Treliving, given that Groulx is one of the few people that has been playing like he wants to be with the Leafs.

Groulx has clearly played his way past Jacob Quillan and the only criticism for the centre might be that his results have been too good for the club at a time when losing could have put Toronto on a path to having a top five pick in the entry draft this summer.

Maybe it just comes down to having Groulx be able to return to the Marlies without waivers and wanting him to be a part of that playoff run and get in some meaningful hockey this spring. If so, Groulx was perhaps a victim of his own success. Or maybe it comes down to the without points in his past three games his novelty has worn off and now the narrative has shifted towards his struggles in the faceoff circle.

Whatever the reasoning may be, Groulx is still under contract for next season and will benefit from coming into camp with a few more eyes on him and with more appreciation for the fact that a roster spot is well within his reach.

It’s probably too early to say what Easton Cowan is and isn’t. Minutes don’t immediately translate into offensive success and with the Leafs lineup currently missing its main offensive catalyst, Cowan not immediately being able to generate offence on his own shouldn’t be held against him, but should be considered in the Leafs plans for him.

Cowan might not look out of place against tougher competition as his first full NHL season winds to a close, his effort and work ethic can’t be questioned, and he’s on board with doing what his coach asks of him. That is a bit of a mixed blessing as what Craig Berube is telling him might not necessarily be the message for Cowan next year and that could change what the Leafs get out of him, as he could be used in more skilled situations or could wind up with a coach that further leans into his all situation abilities. Not an ideal situation for a young player to be in, but Cowan wouldn’t be the first to deal with this transition.

What does seem true in that Cowan will be the kind of player the Leafs are happy to have in their lineup but likely won’t be a high-end contributor the way Matthew Knies is and penciling him in as a potential top six option would be a misstep for the Maple Leafs, although considering Cowan a lock for the top nine next season now seems more than fair.

The remaining schedule and increased difficulty in workload should be providing the player development department with meaningful data to come up with an offseason plan and that information can easily be transferred to whomever is behind the bench next season. While expectations may need to be kept reasonable with Cowan, he should be considered a success story this season.

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