For about two months during the 2023-24 season, the Toronto Maple Leafs’ crease was unexpectedly steered by Martin Jones, the No. 3 goaltender in the organization.
While Joseph Woll was out with a high ankle sprain and Ilya Samsonov floundered (to the point of being waived), Jones stepped in and held things together. He wasn’t spectacular, posting a .907 save percentage across 20 games from early December to late February, but he was effective enough; the Leafs went 11-7-1 in his starts.
Fast-forward two years, and the burden of rescuing the Leafs, amid injuries to Woll and Anthony Stolarz, has fallen to Dennis Hildeby, who was Jones’ backup, oddly enough, for much of that 2023-24 run.
It is a huge ask of the 24-year-old, arguably even more than what was asked of Jones. For one thing, the Leafs are in a much more precarious position than they were two seasons ago. Even after capturing 9 of a possible 12 points in their last six (4-1-1), this team is still not in a playoff spot. Stolarz won’t be back anytime soon, and it’s conceivable for Woll to miss a few weeks, perhaps returning even after the Christmas break. Even when Woll returns, the Leafs won’t be able to stuff him with starts again after the latest injury breakdown.
Hildeby is going to need to play — a lot — in the coming weeks and months.
Unlike Hildeby, Jones had a wealth of experience when he was called upon in the fall of 2023. He had 430 NHL starts before he became a Leaf and had been a No. 1 in net for a long, long time, including the previous season with the Seattle Kraken. Starting three times a week, against NHL shooters, was normal for Jones.
It’s all new for Hildeby, who ranked 19th in the AHL last season with a .908 save percentage in 30 games.
Dennis Hildeby has made 10 total NHL starts in his short career. (Dan Hamilton / Imagn Images)
Hildeby’s Saturday start against the Montreal Canadiens was his 10th, total, in the NHL.
Overall, the numbers for Hildeby in those 10 starts aren’t great, with a save percentage of .896. However, in four (busy) starts this season, that number is a spiffy .922, including Saturday’s .971 with 34 shots against. It’s a tiny sample, obviously. Those starts were spread out too.
They won’t be now that he’s the temporary starter.
Hildeby should get three starts this week, and they won’t be easy. He’ll face Andrei Vasilevskiy and the division-leading Tampa Bay Lightning on Monday, Macklin Celebrini and the San Jose Sharks on Thursday, and Connor McDavid and Leon Draisaitl on Saturday.
If Woll remains out the following week, Hildeby will get another three starts and perhaps more after that. (Artur Akhtyamov’s NHL debut figures to come Dec. 21 in Dallas if Woll isn’t back before then.)
A bad two-week stretch could bury the Leafs and require an otherworldly heater to get back in the mix. A solid stretch, on the other hand, with serviceable, Jones-like play from Hildeby, could have this team in a good-to-decent spot when Woll returns.
It might only be a slight exaggeration to say the season is resting on Hildeby’s shoulders right now.
10 things I like, don’t like or find interesting about the Leafs right now
1. It’s at least notable that in the wake of Woll’s departure at training camp, the front office sought someone else to back up Stolarz while waiting for Woll. Not Hildeby, in other words, an alternative stand-in with more NHL experience. That someone was waiver claim Cayden Primeau, who struggled in his three starts despite that experience and was eventually waived (and claimed by the Carolina Hurricanes).
Whether they have to go the external route again, whether it’s through trade or via waivers once more, will be determined by Hildeby and what he makes of this opportunity. The uncertainty with Stolarz, not to mention another injury for Woll, makes it imperative that this team has a No. 3 it can trust.
2. One thing Hildeby has done well is stop the good stuff. He has denied 48 of 56 shots from the high-danger zone. Acknowledging the limited sample, that .857 save percentage is a top-10 mark among goalies this season.
3. The Leafs controlled just 36 percent of expected goals against the Habs on Saturday, their fourth-worst mark all season.
They did, however, surrender only five attempts from high-danger zones at five-on-five, which was tied for their third-stingiest mark of the season.
4. The biggest impact Scott Laughton has made since he returned from injury isn’t the goals, though he has three in the last three games.
It’s the steadiness he has brought to a penalty kill that’s been much improved of late (90.5 percent in eight games). The coaching staff has slotted Laughton on the first unit of the PK, and he has delivered, as the results can attest:
Leafs’ penalty-killing forwards
Laughton has also won over 63 percent of his short-handed draws, which helps.
5. No team has scored fewer goals (10) on the power play this season than the Leafs. (For context, the Stars lead the league with 30.)
It’s striking that Matthew Knies was recently replaced on the top unit by Easton Cowan, given it was Knies’ addition to PP1 (coupled with Mitch Marner slotting into the quarterback role) that spurred last season’s turnaround. Clearly, the coaching staff thought it needed more playmaking on the unit.
I kind of wonder if the Leafs should simply go back to where they started with their top group this fall, with Morgan Rielly alongside Knies, Auston Matthews, John Tavares and William Nylander. It didn’t look good at all, no doubt. Breakouts and entries were an issue. And yet, for what it’s worth given the super-duper small sample, the underlying results were strong and actually comparable to what the Marner-led PP1 delivered (alongside Knies, Matthews, Tavares and Nylander) last season.
Per 60 minsRielly (25-26)Marner (24-25)
Shots
70.3
65.0
Attempts
145.7
123.1
HD attempts
37.7
30.6
Expected goals
11.2
10.5
Goals
7.5
12.8
SH%
10.7
19.6
6. For the first time all season, Tavares and Nylander are slumping.
Tavares has gone pointless in four of the last five and has scored only once in his last seven outings. Fatigue may have set in for the 35-year-old after the heavy load he was forced to take on in Matthews’ absence last month.
Nylander, a point-producing machine to start the season with at least one in 19 of his first 21 games, has gone the last three games without a point. It’s his first such drought since January. He hasn’t skated with his usual pop of late (and might be playing through something).
Their line, rounded out by Cowan, struggled to get anything going against Montreal. By the third period, Craig Berube had lifted Cowan for Bobby McMann.
The McMann-Tavares-Nylander minutes haven’t been a home run this season, with the Leafs winning right around 50 percent of the expected goals.
John Tavares is amid his first slump of the season. (James Guillory / Imagn Images)
So, what now?
Though it doesn’t seem likely, given he’s been sitting every night of late and Berube doesn’t seem to be a fan, I wonder if it’s worth giving Matias Maccelli another try with Tavares and Nylander at some point.
That threesome had some success in a limited run earlier this season: 60 percent of expected goals in about 44 minutes.
7. The flip could be as simple as this: Maccelli in for Nick Robertson, who logged a season-low 6:58 on Saturday, and play him alongside Tavares and Nylander.
Return McMann to duty with Nic Roy and Dakota Joshua, a trio that’s been punchy of late, and slide Cowan back alongside Laughton and Steven Lorentz, a combination Berube was excited about at camp.
Knies – Matthews – Domi
Maccelli – Tavares – Nylander
Joshua – Roy – McMann
Lorentz – Laughton – Cowan
8. Troy Stecher’s wide-ranging and totally unexpected impact includes the benefit he has brought to Matthews on the top line.
In short, his ability to move and transport pucks has Matthews’ line getting onto offence faster and more often, while sliding Jake McCabe back to his strong side next to him.
Consider the striking difference between Matthews’ minutes this season with the McCabe and Simon Benoit pairing, which struggled to get pucks moving in the right direction, versus the McCabe and Stecher pairing.
Matthews with …
For/againstBenoit-McCabeMcCabe-Stecher
Minutes
29:28
23:55
Shots
10-15
11-7
Attempts
18-34
20-16
Chances
9-17
12-7
Expected goals
37%
66%
9. An interesting little tweak the coaching staff made recently: removing Philippe Myers from a regular role on the penalty kill for Morgan Rielly, who hadn’t killed penalties for most of the season.
Following Cole Caufield’s power-play goal Saturday, which came against the Rielly-Benoit pairing, out came Rielly and back in went Myers.
10. I’m not sure the Leafs can stick with the Benoit-Myers third pairing for much longer. The team is getting destroyed in their minutes — hurt, badly, by a lack of puck-moving prowess.
Their numbers in the last three games aren’t pretty:
Shots: 2-17
Shot attempts: 8-47
Scoring chances: 3-19
Expected goals: 33 percent
Do the Leafs think they’re better off with Dakota Mermis in there instead, with either Mermis or Benoit playing on their off side? The answer might be no.
— Stats and research courtesy of Natural Stat Trick, Hockey-Reference, NHL EDGE and Evolving-Hockey