TORONTO — That corner the Toronto Maple Leafs looked to be turning is suddenly in the past.
That’s three losses in the last four games now (1-1-2), the most emphatic of which came in blowout fashion, 6-3, against the Edmonton Oilers on Saturday, a night in which the Leafs were embarrassed by the superstar duo of Connor McDavid and Leon Draisaitl.
It looked like another third-period meltdown, not unlike the one that went down two nights earlier against the San Jose Sharks. And it definitely was that. But the unraveling really began in the final minute of the second period when, in a tie game, Nick Robertson attempted a no-look pass from behind the Edmonton goal.
A dangerous play at an inopportune time made more dangerous by one of the opponents on the ice, the best possible opponent on the ice: McDavid, who promptly led a rush the other way that ended with a go-ahead goal for the Oilers.
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— Edmonton Oilers (@EdmontonOilers) December 14, 2025
The whole sequence irked coach Craig Berube afterward. Not just the turnover, but the fact Robertson and linemate Nic Roy could have changed and didn’t.
“We have to be better managing games and certain situations,” Scott Laughton said in the aftermath of the loss. “You see those guys, you know how good they are in moments, and they can turn on you that quick.”
It was over not long after that.
The Oilers scored twice, 34 seconds apart, in the opening two minutes of the third to ice it. Both goals came opposite the Leafs’ No. 2 line of Bobby McMann, John Tavares, and William Nylander, along with the defence pairing of Morgan Rielly and Oliver Ekman-Larsson.
Ekman-Larsson was beaten for position in front of the net on the first one and then turned over the puck (and missed on a big neutral zone hit), which led to the second one as his partner, Rielly, was outmaneuvered for position in front of Dennis Hildeby.
Draisaitl set up both goals.
“We weren’t hard enough around our net,” Berube said on a night when the Leafs allowed 17 high-danger shot attempts, “100 percent.”
The Rielly-Ekman-Larsson pair had a particularly rough night, hit for three goals against (and one more each for both apart) in the loss, including McDavid’s spectacular game-opening marker, in which he blew past both defenders.
The Leafs have been eking by without two top-four defenders, Chris Tanev and Brandon Carlo. This was a night when those absences were highlighted, when Rielly and a 34-year-old Ekman-Larsson, who dodged a serious injury in that overtime loss to San Jose, were exposed by McDavid and Draisaitl.
Also, those injuries in goal to Anthony Stolarz and Joseph Woll in goal. This was a night when Hildeby looked the inexperienced goaltender he is, even if the help in front of him was most definitely lacking.
The Leafs were embarrassed by the superstar duo of Connor McDavid, left, and Leon Draisaitl. (Nick Turchiaro / Imagn Images)
Puck play was an issue, too. It was a failed Roy-to-Robertson exchange just inside the Edmonton zone that sprang McDavid for that first goal.
“We just gotta know we don’t have to make the perfect play every shift,” Laughton said. “It’s a 60-minute game for a reason. We gotta wear the (other) team down, go the other way, play north, make them come 200 feet. I don’t think we did enough of that.”
The Oilers (McDavid primarily) were quick, Laughton acknowledged, but “We played into their speed too. You can limit them a little bit. Obviously, they’ve got two of the best players in the world, but you can make it harder on them getting up and down the ice.
“It’s just not good enough.”
Berube was befuddled by the way his team started the third, a problem that lies at the feet of the players as well as the coach.
“It’s been two games in a row at home where we come out, and we look flat,” he said. “Our leaders gotta take control of it, a lot more than they are right now.”
Those leaders had a quiet night.
This was a night when Edmonton’s best players were better than the Leafs’ best players, by a lot. Auston Matthews was kept off the scoresheet in 17.5 minutes during a head-to-head matchup with McDavid. Nylander, struggling to play through an illness (he logged less than 14 minutes), and Tavares also failed to record a point. Both were scored against three times. Only Matthew Knies was consistently dangerous.
The Leafs have scored only eight goals in their last four games.
“To me, it’s all a mindset,” Berube said. “We just gotta have more urgency and be more direct in how we want to play.”
The Leafs can’t afford to lose the edge it looked like they were slowly beginning to find earlier this month, particularly in a thorough Monday night win over the Tampa Bay Lightning. They’re still not in a playoff position. Too deep a hole was dug to get by, and ultimately get ahead, on a week or two of solid play.
“We gotta start pushing,” Laughton said, “have some urgency and get going.”
— Stats and research courtesy of Natural Stat Trick and Hockey Reference.