Dallas Eakins says Maple Leafs need to diagnose truth, not perception of team ahead of pivotal offseason<\/p>\n
The buzzword around the Toronto Maple Leafs<\/a>\u2019 2025-26 regular season was \u2018culture\u2019. Whether it was the lack of effort on any given night or the poor response to Radko Gudas\u2019 hit on Auston Matthews, something seemed off within the locker room for this version of the Maple Leafs club.\u00a0On Tuesday morning, Former Maple Leafs assistant and Toronto Marlies head coach Dallas Eakins joined Leafs Morning Take<\/a> with Nick Alberga and Jay Rosehill to discuss how he viewed the Maple Leafs\u2019 culture under Craig Berube, how he viewed Easton Cowan\u2019s rookie campaign and what he feels needs to be the first step in the next general manager\u2019s tenure.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cI\u2019m a big fan of Craig Berube. He\u2019s a really good coach, he is a demanding guy, and I think he can be an inspiring guy as well, but the one thing I really believe is that it just can\u2019t be one guy. It can\u2019t just be Craig trying to do the inspiring,\u201d Eakins said. \u201cIt needs to be a group that is infecting the culture. I think when you come into a locker room, there is no buy-in, you are infected right away by that culture, and damn, you want to make sure that you have a good one going because I think it\u2019s the lifeblood of really good organizations.\u201d<\/p>\n While not much went right for the Maple Leafs this year, one of the lone bright spots was the progression of Easton Cowan as the season went on. The 20-year-old forward appeared in 66 games, recording 11 goals and 18 assists, while also becoming a fan favourite with his fearless ability to step up for teammates over the regular season\u2019s final two months. Upon the completion of the regular season, the Maple Leafs announced that Cowan is going to join the Marlies for their upcoming playoffs. Over four games to close out the Marlies\u2019 regular season, Cowan posted one goal and two assists. Eakins touched on the decision to allow Cowan to gain some professional playoff hockey experience.<\/p>\n \u201cI love it. I\u2019m all for that, all the time, every time, and I think it\u2019s a great decision by the organization. I think it\u2019s going to be a great experience for the kid. These kids come out of junior and college, where they were the guys. They were heavily relied on, and then you get into your first NHL season, and you aren\u2019t the guy,\u201d Eakins said. \u201cSometimes you can get lost, so go back to the Marlies, and he\u2019s going to be heavily relied upon. They\u2019re going to need a certain level of play out of him. It\u2019s going to be expected, and I\u2019m sure he\u2019s going to wrap his arms around it, so I think it\u2019s wonderful. I think any time you have that chance as a young player to go get that playoff experience, it\u2019s an important one, and it\u2019s going to be great for the organization moving forward.\u201d<\/p>\n As for the organization, many questions surround whoever is going to be the team\u2019s next GM. What happens with Auston Matthews? Do the Maple Leafs need to move a goaltender this summer? With many decisions looming, Eakins spoke about what he believes is the crucial first move for the organization.<\/p>\n \u201cI think the first thing that needs to be done is they need to diagnose the truth and not the perception. There\u2019s a lot of perceptions going on with the Toronto Maple Leafs right now, and you\u2019ve got to get to the truth. You\u2019ve got to figure out, can this team be competitive, or are they stuck in mud? Are your core players good enough to win in the NHL? What\u2019s the prospect line look like? Are some contracts assets or anchors?\u201d Eakins said. \u201cBefore you get to your first move, you better have diagnosed that truthfully and not perception-wise or by going off what the fans want to hear.\u201d<\/p>\n Sponsored by bet365<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Dallas Eakins says Maple Leafs need to diagnose truth, not perception of team ahead of pivotal offseason The…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":518480,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5106],"tags":[5,20,5172,4,66,31,5171],"class_list":{"0":"post-557974","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-toronto-maple-leafs","8":"tag-hockey","9":"tag-maple-leafs","10":"tag-mapleleafs","11":"tag-nhl","12":"tag-toronto","13":"tag-toronto-maple-leafs","14":"tag-torontomapleleafs"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nhl\/116448630395495861","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/557974","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=557974"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/557974\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/518480"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=557974"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=557974"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=557974"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}