The Leafs entered their Christmas break on a high note, thanks to firmly having the number of Kyle Dubas’ Penguins over the past couple of seasons. A 6-3 win, with William Nylander showing up all over the scoresheet was an optimistic turn for a team that needed to make a statement following the firing of Marc Savard, and the mission was accomplished. Less optimistically, the Leafs are still at the bottom of the Atlantic Division and have the second worst points percentage in the Eastern Conference. There is also going to be a lot of hockey crammed into the next five weeks with only one occurrence of two days off and three back-t0-backs before the Olympics. Every team is a similar boat and it might come down who can stay the healthiest and handle the endurance of this schedule the best to determine the playoff picture.
Here are some other stray thoughts:
Berube being marked safe makes sense
Lalonde, Van Ryn, and Gruden are all capable of Pete Horachek type filler roles, but the interim tag would stick and the Leafs would likely still be looking for a Berube replacement in the offseason anyway.
The Maple Leafs likely would want to avoid paying too many people for too long to not be working for the organization.
And despite votes of confidence for Craig Berube, and the sense that nothing is urgent on Brad Treliving, there is also benefit to a potentially new GM getting the opportunity to pick his own coach, free of any organizational barriers including an interim coach being unsustainably good.
Right now, a head coaching decision would be rushed and based in the best available options when options are most limited.
While Craig Berube hasn’t been great for the Leafs, he’s not the pressing issue at the moment, Brad Treliving is, and if there is potentially a new GM coming at some point, allowing them the opportunity to pick who works for them makes sense.
The difficulty in measuring World Junior success
A long, long time ago I remember watching the World Juniors and becoming overly confident that Chris Didomenico was going to be a solid prospect for the Maple Leafs. The World Juniors at one point also convinced the Maple Leafs organization that Justin Pogge was just as promising a goaltending prospect as Tuukka Rask.
If you are cheering on your country at the World Juniors and are ignoring how Maple Leafs prospects are doing in the tournament, you’ll potentially have a good time (assuming how confident you feel in Hockey Canada lately and assuming Canada is the country you are cheering for.)
This is far more of an “it was an honour just to be nominated” type situation and there is a lot more that can be understood about these prospects by following their results with their club teams.
That being said, there are a few interesting things to watch for. Will these defencemen be seeing icetime in final minutes of close games? How much space are they allowing their opposition. How strong do they look in front of the net and in puck battles? Are they capable of making a play to move the puck out of the defensive zone or do they chip it out? Understanding how comfortably they play against the best players in their age group can be telling and I look forward to putting on my amateur scout hat and learning a bit more about a couple of players I barely get a chance to watch.