John Tavares believes Maple Leafs will return to playoffs but says team needs to earn their spot more than ever

The Toronto Maple Leafs faltered in a big way in 2025-26, after so many years of making the playoffs and going home early. It was a reality check for a team that had perhaps gotten used to making the playoffs every year with teams like the Ottawa Senators and Buffalo Sabres (who are both competing in this year’s playoffs) being stuck in perpetual rebuilds.

It’s the first time veteran John Tavares missed the playoffs since joining the Leafs back in 2018, and while this was far from Tavares’ first postmortem after a disappointing end to the season, there was a real somber tone to his voice as he discussed the missed opportunity that was the 2025-26 season.

“Yeah, obviously I didn’t foresee that,” Tavares said when asked if he expected to be delivering this message without any playoff games. “But I’m also not naive to know how difficult it is to get to the playoffs and the challenges that the league brings…leaguewide, teams that have been building for a number of years and where they’re at now, the challenge that brings, not that our division wasn’t always difficult. You know how hard it is to earn a playoff spot in this league, so you’re not naive to that, but to see where we’ve ended up, coming of the break, things really got off track for us.”

When asked about his confidence in this season being a one-off, Tavares said that he was confident but that the Leafs can’t take next year’s regular season for granted.

“We have to go out there and earn prove that and earn it,” Tavares said. “You know, we had high expectations this year and we didn’t come close. So the challenge going forward for the group is to regroup, continue to work together to find the areas we need to be better in, and our level of play just has to be much, much higher.”

Most veterans look forward to the offseason more and more as they get older, but Tavares, 35, doesn’t want to stop playing just yet. He wants to play for Team Canada at the upcoming IIHF World Hockey Championships before he gets some rest and begins his preparation for next season.

“I would say things are trending really strongly to participate there. So, just working through a few details with Hockey Canada, but my intention is to go play.”

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