TORONTO — The boos might have rained louder had more Toronto Maple Leafs fans stuck around for the final buzzer.
But, hey, it’s a frigid weeknight and a quiet hockey game and another losing effort on home ice.
Why hang around and jeer when you can beat traffic and get under the duvet early?
So, the boo birds that circled Scotiabank Arena in Tuesday’s 4-1 loss to the Dallas Stars weren’t quite as vociferous as the ones flying during Saturday’s 3-0 shutout by the Vancouver Canucks.
The opponent was tougher; the effort was better.
Yet and still: A first-place squad getting razzed off its own sheet on consecutive nights certainly underscores Leafs Nation’s frustration with an offence that has gone as dry as the January you’re pretending to have.
“I mean, I think it’s frustrating losing,” said defenceman Oliver-Ekman Larsson, as Toronto’s losing skid reached a season-worst three games. “So, I think we feel the same way.”
Coach Craig Berube shrugged off the faithful’s bad review: “They do it in every rink, don’t they? I mean, it’s part of the game. They pay good money, and they come to see hockey, and they want to see us win. That’s the way it goes.”
Perhaps.
But we’d argue that things go a little differently in this city with this specific core of players.
And the snap negativity flung toward a decent but flawed team’s midseason dip, be it from the golds or on the ’Gram, speaks toward a justified impatience.
Zoom out, and the Maple Leafs have done fine through 45 games.
They’ve weathered a storm of injuries and adjusted reasonably well to Berube’s revamped system. Their goaltending has elevated, their penalty kill has improved, and their net-front protection has tightened up like post-Christmas spending.
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But it’s the familiarity of old warts that become harder to tolerate the longer this player-fan relationship drags on without the reward of a springtime breakthrough:
• A power-play that, judging by the personnel, was built to be a difference-maker but, after a couple pinged posts on an 0-for-2 night, continues to rank below average.
“Special teams were the difference tonight,” said Berube, who took issue with the ticky-tack neutral-zone slashing penalty that led to Dallas’ game-winning power-play strike.
“They want to call that on John Tavares, that second penalty, but they’re gonna let everything else go in the game?”
• A team that has invested a disproportionate amount of its cap space to offensive stars yet has morphed into a middle-of-the-pack team when it comes to shooting, scoring, and generating high-danger looks.
“Our execution can be better,” Auston Matthews said. “I mean, we’re going through adversity right now. And as much as you prefer not to go through that, it’s necessary sometimes, and these are the kind of moments where we gotta come together even more and stick with each other and work our way out of it.”
Added Berube: “We’re not getting the bounces, but we’re not executing good enough as well. I think we can execute better. We seem a little off on the execution part of things.”
• A familiar lack of secondary scoring (Max Domi has three goals and three more seasons beyond this one on his contract). Plus, a performance lag from the usual suspects at the top of the lineup.
Morgan Rielly is a team-worst minus-15 and it’s been nine games since he’s finished on the plus side of the ledger.
William Nylander has slipped from an early Rocket-conversation guy to a rumour with one goal in 11 games. He’s in year 1 of the richest contract in Maple Leafs history.
• And the occasional disconnect between the product and the producers’ view of the product. Mitch Marner’s “I thought we played well” assessment of Saturday’s shutout didn’t, uh, play well in the market. He has since declined to meet with reporters on Monday and Tuesday.
All of this is to say, these boos in this city run a little deeper.
Ironically, Berube is preaching a patient game while the diehards’ patience is at its thinnest.
Now, that doesn’t mean a three-game skid spells panic or the Maple Leafs can’t pop this ship back on track, starting Thursday, when former coach Sheldon Keefe leads the Devils into town.
The talent hasn’t suddenly disappeared. It just needs to show up. (And getting Jake McCabe and Anthony Stolarz healthy will help.)
Because the masses’ reaction to Toronto’s first legitimate slump of a largely drama-free campaign has reminded how swiftly things can sour.
“We know that we have it in this room,” Ekman-Larsson said. “We just gotta work a little bit harder when things are not going our way.”
The fans will respect that.
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• Matthews and Marner did open the scoring with Steven Lorentz on their left wing, but Berube smashed the blender and scrapped that much-discussed experiment before the game was half over.
Eventually, Matthew Knies returned to his regular spot.
• Dallas’s top centreman and leading goal scorer, Roope Hintz, left the game with an upper-body injury and did not return. He was on the business end of a big Matthews hit early.
Dallas coach Pete DeBoer did not have an update post-game. Hintz will need further evaluation back in Dallas.
• The Stars finally snapped their seven-game losing skid against the Leafs, ending Toronto’s longest active win streak against a specific team.
Heading into the game, DeBoer was asked about the key to reversing the trend.
“Our Robertson has to outplay their Robertson for the first time,” DeBoer grinned. “So, that message is going to be delivered clearly here to Jason for us. We got to start there. Obviously, I’m joking.”
Kidding not kidding.
Nick had won all five head-to-head meetings against Jason, outscoring his big brother 3-0 in those contests.
Pre-game, Nick smiled when explaining that he doesn’t brag about one-upping his sibling in these clashes. But… “he knows.”
The worm turned: Nick got shut out Tuesday, while Jason registered an assist.
• Toronto is among the teams interested in ex-Leaf, ex-Star John Klingberg, who is training in the GTA in an effort to resume his NHL career.
While we’re rooting for the 32-year-old righty and applaud his efforts to rebound from bilateral hip surgery, the Leafs should let another team roll the dice here. (Ottawa and Edmonton, both firmly in the D market, also reportedly have interest.) He hasn’t been a difference-maker since leaving Dallas three years ago.
To be eligible for the playoffs, Klingberg needs to be under contract by March 7.
• Speaking of Swedes you may have forgotten about, Calle Järnkrok is now skating and hanging around the team again.
While he is progressing well from sports hernia surgery, the Leafs are waiting a couple more weeks to put a timeline on the winger’s return to action.
As tight as they are to the cap, maybe Toronto considers a Marlies conditioning stint, then having Järnkrok as a post-season option.
