TORONTO — If this was the last time Sheldon Keefe stepped in front of a microphone as head coach of the Toronto Maple Leafs, he left with his head held high.
Keefe, left in what must have been an uncomfortable position, spoke to reporters during a locker-cleaning session Monday with no formal guarantee that he would be back behind the team’s bench next season, taking responsibility for a seven-game losing streak in the first round against Boston. Both men suffered. The Bruins expressed confidence in their ability to prevent a repeat of this next year.
“I believe in myself so much,” he said. “I love coaching the Toronto Maple Leafs. I believe in myself and my team now more than ever, and I believe that me and my team will win.”
I wonder if he’ll ever get that chance of The burning question remained hanging in the air during this period until word came from team management. Originally scheduled for Thursday, the team announced Monday night that the schedule had been moved to Friday, general manager Brad Treliving, team president Brendan Shanahan and Maple Leaf Sports. & Entertainment’s president and CEO Keith Perry are all scheduled to attend. Attendance.
This is a notable departure from the way the Leafs have handled their postseason media duties in the past, and will only fuel speculation that Keefe’s future is still under consideration.
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Keefe is under contract through 2025-2026, although he signed a two-year contract extension last August that has not yet been officially triggered, but may not be able to avoid the cut-off line. Replacing him is the easiest big change the organization could pursue this offseason, as the five highest-paid players all have contracts with no-transfer clauses.
This would also be consistent with a trend in which 17 of Keefe’s colleagues have been fired by NHL teams in the past 13 months alone.
As a result of the unprecedented mass turnover, they are now able to hire a number of veteran coaches, including Craig Berube, Todd McClellan, and Gerard Gallant.
While Keefe boasts a regular season scoring percentage that exceeds those players, his .665 being the best coach in NHL history with at least 300 games of experience, all of them had far greater success in Stanley. Have a resume that includes. Cup playoffs.
That’s essentially what Leafs management will have to address when making next year’s coaching decisions. How much responsibility does Keefe ultimately bear for the team’s inability to translate a strong regular season into a long playoff run?
That has been a consistent theme in five trips to the postseason, four of which ended in first-round eliminations. Despite boasting a roster with multiple elite offensive talents, the Leafs have only scored two or more goals in one of their last 14 playoff games. In this recent series loss to the Bruins, he allowed a league-worst 1.71 goals per game while going 1-for-21 on the power play.
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“Early in the series we had no problems,” Keefe said. “We were creating a lot of (chances). We were leading the league in inside slot shots and rebounding, and we were getting a lot of pucks in the first few games of the series. They withered away later. But we also played much better defensively and didn’t necessarily need as much offensive power to win games.
“I think the level of perseverance we showed in those games is ultimately what we need to win in the playoffs.”
In fact, Keefe believes he was one goal short of changing the conversation across the group. If they had found a way to win Game 7 in overtime instead of allowing David Pastrnak to end his season with a set piece that stunned Toronto’s defense, they would have won their third straight game at 2-1. “The story would have been over pretty quickly after that,” Keefe said. “The change now is that the Leafs played close games and figured out how to win close games.”
“Come from behind. Show the fight. All these things are things that get you excited. I’m going into Game 6 feeling as good about the Toronto Maple Leafs as I’ve felt in this position.” We finished. It was because of how we played and how we came together.”
This is essentially the second spring in a row, and his future remains up in the air.
After Mr. Treliving replaced his former boss, Kyle Dubas, last June, Mr. Keefe went through an exhaustive process that included 17 hours of meetings over three days. He essentially had to convince a previously unaffiliated GM that he was still qualified for the role.
“We were able to do this because we think we have a really good coach here,” Treliving said after giving Keefe a two-year contract extension last summer. “His performance in the regular season proves that. What he’s accomplished here in his young career puts him in really good company in terms of coaches past and present.
“The more we went through this process with Sheldon, the more we realized it made a lot of sense to get something done, to take care of him and leave it to us.”
Keefe is the fifth-longest tenured coach in the NHL, and his top three, John Cooper of the Tampa Bay Lightning, Mike Sullivan of the Pittsburgh Penguins, and Jared Bednar of the Colorado Avalanche, all played for Stanley with their current teams. He has won a cup.
Rod Brind’Amour sits at No. 4 and has led the Carolina Hurricanes to at least one playoff series win in his six years coaching them. They are still alive and will face the New York Rangers in the second round.
Keefe only has one series win to show for it during his time with the Leafs, but the team was actually better overall in this year’s first-round loss to Boston than it was in last year’s game against Tampa Bay, which won six straight, including three overtime wins. I believe he gave a good performance. .
“I really liked the determination they showed in this series, especially in Games 5 and 6,” Keefe said. “That gave me a chance to play in Game 7. But obviously that’s not enough, and that makes sense to me.”
So he’s waiting to see if he’ll be the one looking for a solution next year.
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(Photo: Nick LaChance/Getty Images)
