DALLAS — William Nylander is never the loudest of the Toronto Maple Leafs in front of the microphone. But in the minutes after his team struggled again to find the back of the net, his voice still fell just above a whisper.
The uber-confident star winger has produced at more than a point per game on average over the past four seasons. But like his teammates, Nylander is now in the middle of a snake-bitten stretch derailing a season that began with hopes of a Stanley Cup.
“I don’t know if I’ve felt like this before,” Nylander admitted after the Leafs’ 5-1 loss to the Dallas Stars. “If I had a stretch like this, I’m not sure. I don’t feel like I’ve had that in the NHL, at least.”
When the Leafs return to Toronto on Monday from a grueling three-game road trip, they’ll do so with three more losses and plenty of reasons to shake their heads in disbelief.
Still, against the Stars, just when they did so many things right, the Leafs still couldn’t manage a win. That’s what will make the loss even more bewildering.
They played their best game of their three-game road trip and probably deserved a better fate. And yet they’re judged on their record, and Sunday’s loss kept them firmly in the Eastern Conference basement. Like a bad piece of candy, the sour could linger longer than the sweet.
“We need to finish, right?” Leafs head coach Craig Berube said. “One goal is not going to cut it most nights. But I thought we defended extremely well tonight.”
Berube’s team outshot a Stars team that should be considered a bona fide Stanley Cup favourite 28-22. It was just the second time in nine games the Leafs actually outshot their opponent. And they did well to get to the middle of the ice and create legitimately dangerous scoring chances, too.
Their puck movement looked improved. There was more urgency in the way the Leafs skated than there had been over their previous games as well.
Remember, this Leafs team was playing on a lack of rest following a loss in Nashville and a not-insignificant flight the night before. And their worst game of the season three nights earlier in Washington clearly still hung over their heads.
But the Leafs defied expectations and put up two of their best periods of the road trip. When Auston Matthews (who, it has to be said, looked active and noticeable with the puck all night against the Stars) stripped the puck from defenceman Thomas Harley and raced toward the goal on a first-period breakaway, some of the Leafs stood on the bench. It felt like the moment the team had been waiting for, and the moment so much of Leafs Nation had been pining for as well: a Rocket Richard winner in the middle of a down season, delivering when his lagging team and a desperate fan base needed it most.
It wasn’t meant to be, as Stars goalie Jake Oettinger flashed his glove and turned Matthews aside.
Matthews, like Nylander (and maybe like the rest of the Leafs), could only watch in disbelief. Matthews and others created chances against the Stars, which should create confidence among a group that clearly needs it. But with chances and no goals, they can now add “bad luck” to a season that has been bad in so many other ways, too.
They need that luck to turn.
“It’s hard,” Scott Laughton, the Leafs’ lone goal scorer, said of the team’s effort to maintain positivity. “It weighs on guys. Guys care and that’s the biggest thing. If it didn’t weigh on guys then we’d have a bigger problem, right?”
Sunday’s game suggested a lack of finishing is hurting the Leafs more than a lack of effort and a lack of self-belief is. Without those last two pieces of the puzzle, it would certainly be easy to leave the American Airlines Center feeling like the Leafs’ season is done and dusted.
“Over the last two games, there’s been a lot of better things in our game, but in the end you’re not getting rewarded for it. And that’s the frustrating part,” Matthews said. “It’s tough when you’re in a stretch like this to stay positive and continue to grind it out. But that’s all we can do right now. Like I said the other night, we’ve got to pick each other up.”
Still, if you’re Craig Berube and company, you have to leave Dallas also feeling like you need more out of your stars, some of whom have gone desperately quiet as the losses pile up. Moral victories don’t matter if a team’s stars can’t find the back of the net more consistently. The Leafs scored just four goals over their three-game road trip. That’s not going to turn the tide of a season that is still going south.
The Leafs need more from their power play, which — even after the two units were mixed — still ended the road trip 0-for-10 with the man advantage. Leafs assistant coach Marc Savard needs to instill more changes to the power play as much as those players need to improve their execution.
“Obviously we’ve been dry on power play,” John Tavares said. “That changes the way the game gets played at times, when you’re able to put the puck back in the net in those opportunities and whatnot. And then we’ve just got to continue to stay with it, sustain puck possession, create opportunities, getting pucks to the net, finding second and thirds where things just become real instinctive and you’re just really hard to defend that way just because you’re playing at a really high level, executing at a high level. So we’ve just got to continue to stick with it.”
The Leafs need more from Nylander, who had his moments against the Stars but now has points in just two of his last 10 games.
“I actually feel pretty good right now,” Nylander said of his game. “Whether it’s me or my line, we’re getting chances. That’s the way you’ve got to look at it.”
The Leafs need more from Matthew Knies, who has one goal in his last 10 games and just two points throughout that stretch. Knies’ hard-charging game has dipped, and he’s not been nearly as menacing around the goal. Big picture, Knies’ offensive game has not evolved this season as many in and outside of the organization hoped it would.
The Leafs need more offence from Tavares, now with just three points in his last 12 games. After a white-hot start, his pace and production have slowed.
The Leafs need more point production from their supporting cast, including Nick Robertson and Max Domi. Matias Maccelli moved the puck creatively enough against the Stars to keep him in the lineup. You cannot say the same for Domi.
And yes, the Leafs most certainly need more goals and goals alone from Matthews. Even with his powerful strides and shifts against the Stars, he still did not register a point through the three-game road trip.
Maybe some breakout games and consistent production afterwards from the majority of the aforementioned players will truly change things and give the Leafs more of the results they feel they deserve.
“It’s all frustrating. It is. The guys feel it. Everybody feels it,” Berube said. “We have to stick with it. If we get some bounces here, it can turn and go the other way.”
The Leafs themselves are still holding out hope that will be the case.
“I keep mentioning it, but I’ve been through this a couple times in my career,” Laughton said. “You’ve got to stay on top of things and make sure we try and stay positive here. You can string some together here and see what happens, but it’s going to have to happen soon.”
For one night, they deserve to feel that way.
But — and there’s always a “but” involved in this Leafs season — they’re still one night closer to finishing the season outside of the postseason for the first time since 2016. The loss leaves them back at .500 and with only one team in the Eastern Conference with a worse record. Any person with a lengthy shopping list will tell you Christmas is fast approaching. It’s another point in the season when NHL teams assess where they are and whether they will be buyers or sellers ahead of the trade deadline.
Whether or not the Leafs want to admit it, an undeserved loss to Stars makes their own reality this season that much more apparent.
“We want bounces. We want luck,” Berube said. “You have to earn them, and you have to keep earning them. It doesn’t just happen.”