David Alter: Toronto Must Learn From the Oilers
David Alter returns to Bodog Sportsbook to discuss yet another season of disappointment for the Toronto Maple Leafs, and what needs to change to bring success.
The Edmonton Oilers are just another example that yes, you can run it back and can eventually break through. So why can’t the Toronto Maple Leafs do it?
The Edmonton Oilers did the thing. They’ve become the first Canadian team to advance to the Stanley Cup Finals since an improbable (and many would say fluky) Montreal Canadiens squeaked their way during the COVID-shortened 2021 season.
Sure, the series isn’t going as planned for Kris Knoblauch and his troops, but they’ve still made it to the promised land that Toronto have failed to reach in nearing six decades.
So, how did they do it?
Well. Their stars rose to the occasion. Despite only registering 10 shots on goal in a 2-1 win against the Dallas Stars in Game 6, Connor McDavid helped carry the team forward. His game-opening goal was classic McDavid. Somehow contorting his body and willing himself toward the goal to beat Dallas goalie Jake Oettinger.
They also got solid goaltending from Stuart Skinner, who had been much-maligned during his tenure with the club. He made 34 saves and was essentially the reason Edmonton won Games 5 and 6 of the best-of-seven series.
With a core that is essentially the same, the Oilers proved what any team usually believes: If you give your core enough time, they will eventually find a way to break through.
So why can’t the Toronto Maple Leafs do the same thing?
When watching some of the interviews with the Edmonton Oilers during the series, I noticed something very different about them this year than previous years: Attitude and confidence.
Down 2-1 in the series after a 5-3 loss in Game 3, every player on the Oilers maintained their level of confidence to tie the series at 2. Leon Draisaitl was emphatic about his team’s ability after the game.
“I truly believe that our best beats anyone’s best, it’s just a matter of consistently playing that way and that’s a hard thing to do.”
Have the Maple Leafs ever been so openly confident during the playoffs? Not really. They have more or less said the right things about keeping their goals on winning as a team instead of individual accomplishments. But when they’ve been eliminated year after year, it was just just the same old “learning from it” quotes and not enough anger about the situation. Many times players reiterated that they are “right there.”
Sometimes it takes a different voice. The Oilers were off to a terrible start to their 2023-24 season going 5-12-1. They fired their head coach. They fired coach Jay Woodcroft and installed Knoblauch who got them back on track. It’s become a bit of a trend to fire a coach only to have the replacement get the team to new heights. In 2021, the Canadiens fired Claude Julien and Dominic Ducharme was installed as head coach and led them to one of the more improbably runs in recent memory. Craig Berube took over for Mike Yeo in the 2018-19 season and Berube led the St. Louis Blues to their first Stanley Cup.
Now Berube will try to be the different voice the Maple Leafs need. His main objective will be to instill a confidence not unlike what Edmonton is displaying right now. There’s been a lot of talk over the years about the Leafs not having much of a killer instinct. Berube will have to change that. And if he can’t, maybe it’s a change personnel that is necessary. It sounds like a change in personnel may come regardless. But the Leafs just need a deep run more than anything else. One where they show some meaningful progress. The Oilers seemed to have shown it with every year. Even at their low points.
Over the last seven years, the Bodog Sports hockey odds had the Maple Leafs with the best shot for a Canadian team to break the three decade-long drought in the Great White North. Now Edmonton has a chance to do it (albeit a slim one). As the Leafs just sit there and watch.
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