TORONTO (Jan. 29) – In a season that began with the usual gulping of Kool-Aid [even I took a sip], it must be torturous for fans of the Maple Leafs to recognize that only two meaningful games remain on the 2009-10 schedule. Both matches will be played at the Air Canada Centre and could help to determine whether the Leafs finish dead-last in the National Hockey League standings for the first time in 25 years.
The Carolina Hurricanes come to town, Mar. 2, to begin the post-Olympic portion of the schedule… yes, the same Carolina Hurricanes that were once buried 11 points behind the Blue & White but are now just one victory away from thrusting Toronto into the Eastern Conference basement. On Dec. 15, the Leafs were 12-14-7 for 31 points. The Hurricanes were 7-19-6 for 20 points. Carolina beat the Leafs, 4-2, at the ACC on Jan. 12.
The Edmonton Oilers then arrive on Mar. 13… yes, the same Edmonton Oilers that are an astonishing 1-17-2 since Dec. 15. The lone victory? You guessed it: 3-1 over the Maple Leafs on Dec. 30 at Rexall Place. The Oilers are six points behind Toronto in the overall standings.
That the Leafs have been Edmonton’s only patsy in a month-and-a-half reminds me of a Sunday afternoon nearly 40 years ago. Coincidentally, Oilers’ coach Pat Quinn was also part of that scenario. Not unlike the current team, the 1969-70 Maple Leafs were an embarrassment, finishing last in the six-team East Division with 71 points, a whopping 21 fewer than fifth-place Montreal. In the NHL’s early expansion years, and once the National Football League season was over, CBS televised a Sunday-afternoon game from coast-to-coast in the United States. On Mar. 1, 1970 [a month past my 11th birthday], the CBS cameras were at the Metropolitan Sports Center in Bloomington, Minn. for a matinee between the Maple Leafs and Minnesota North Stars.
As bad as the Leafs were that season, Toronto hockey fans were smelling blood, with Minnesota in a freefall similar to the one Edmonton is experiencing right now. On Jan. 14, 1970, the North Stars defeated St. Louis, 3-2, at the Met Center. It would be their last victory in more than six weeks. On Feb. 28, 1970, the Stars lost, 6-2, at Philadelphia, falling to 0-15-5 in their previous 20 games. That same night, the Leafs and Los Angeles Kings played to a 3-3 tie at Maple Leaf Gardens. A post-game charter flight took the Leafs to Minneapolis-St. Paul Airport for the afternoon encounter the following day against the wobbling Stars.
Final score: Minnesota 8, Toronto 0.
I can still remember sitting dumbfounded in front of my parents’ Admiral color-TV console in the basement of our house in North York [then a suburb of Toronto]. The visitors were decked out in their late-‘60s road uniform – primarily white, with blue shoulder-piping and the blue 11-point Maple Leaf logo adopted the previous year for Canada’s centennial celebration. Minnesota wore its predominantly green home uniform with white and gold trim, and the club’s original logo: a stylized letter “N” with an arrow on the right strand pointing upward at a yellow star. The late Dan Kelly called the action for CBS.
I remember Leafs’ defenseman Jim Dorey blowing his stack in the third period and fighting with North Stars’ forward Claude Larose. As linesman Pat Shetler attempted to intervene, Dorey popped him in the kisser, earning a six-game suspension from NHL president Clarence Campbell. Quinn was part of the debacle, in his second and final season on the Toronto blue line [he’d be claimed by the Vancouver Canucks in the 1970 expansion draft].
Pouring salt on the open flesh-wound of Maple Leaf fans – and just to prove that the nationally-televised annihilation in the U.S. was no fluke – the North Stars marched into Maple Leaf Gardens six nights later [Mar. 7, 1970] and laid a similar beating on the Blue & White… 8-3.
Some things just never change.
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Though NHL commissioner Gary Bettman takes a hammering from the largely-chauvinistic and territorial media here in Canada, Toronto hockey fans should be worshipping the ground he walks on. Can you imagine what it would be like in these parts right about now if Bettman and the league had lost its fight with Jim Balsillie, thereby enabling a transfer of the Phoenix Coyotes to nearby Hamilton? In case you haven’t noticed, the Coyotes – playing in the tougher and deeper Western Conference – are a staggering 21 points ahead of the Leafs in the overall standings, and were able to waltz past the Blue & White, 6-3, at the Air Canada Centre on Dec. 16.
You think it’s tough, Leaf supporters, looking up at Ottawa: 20 points in the distance and riding a franchise-record eight-game win streak? Or the despised Montreal Canadiens, a mere 11 points ahead? Imagine the tizzy if the hockey denizens of Hamilton were able to taunt you about their first-year team playing out of Copps Coliseum? Not only would you be wearing bags over your heads, you’d be tying them at the neck to restrict oxygen flow.
If I were you, I’d put the commish on your Christmas card list for next year.
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Here’s one you can call your bookie with: The Leafs’ chances of landing either Ilya Kovalchuk or Patrick Marleau via trade or free agency before next season are roughly the same as the club going 24-3-1 in its remaining 28 games – the pace required to match Montreal’s eighth-place record [93 points] in the Eastern Conference from last season [though 88 or 90 points should suffice in the East this year].
Why would either of the two most coveted potential free agents even consider joining the mess right now in this city? Apart from the fact Kovalchuk has absolutely no interest in coming to Toronto, and that Marleau would play for 28 other coaches before re-uniting with Ron Wilson, there will be several options available to each man that are much more appealing than the Leafs. The same applies to just about any unrestricted player on the market next summer.
Jamal Mayers and Garnet Exelby have gone public with their wishes, but they probably won’t be the last ones looking to get out of this situation [Vesa Toskala is silently on the list]. General manager Brian Burke faces arguably his toughest professional hockey challenge in convincing free agents to sign here. Particularly those with the potential to make an impact. Third and fourth-liners with limited or no options will find the Leafs appealing, as they have in the past. The better players will look to – and land in – more hopeful circumstances around the league.
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