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They’ll be remembered, not in a good way, as possibly the best Maple Leafs team never to win a playoff series.
Despite changing the blueprint to end a streak of first-round failures, Toronto is once again an early casualty. For the fifth time in the lifespan of the core Auston Matthews, Mitch Marner, William Nylander and Morgan Rielly they were on the wrong side of the handshake line when they couldn’t seal the deal.
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TORONTO — Daniel Smith was about six people from the front of the growing line of healthcare workers waiting to enter Scotiabank Arena.Smith, an operating room manager for the Scarborough Health . . .
Right now, Rielly and the Maple Leafs don t have any. Only questions.
For example, after going up 3-1 in the series with a 4-0 win in Game 4, what happened that they did not hold the lead in any game?
How is it that they are 0-8 in potential series-winning games since last advancing in the Stanley Cup Playoffs in 2004?
And the hottest question among disgruntled Maple Leafs fans: What happened to Matthews and Marner?
Matthews scored once in the series after leading the NHL with 41 goals in the regular season. Marner didn t score any, extending his postseason goal drought to 18 games.
USA TODAY
Toronto Maple Leafs goalie Jack Campbell was distraught after the Montreal Canadiens series-clinching 3-1 victory in Game 7 on Monday night.
A shot from Brendan Gallagher squeezed through his legs to give the Canadiens a 1-0 lead in the second period and Montreal went on to complete a comeback from a 3-1 series deficit. It’s just tough, Campbell said in near tears. I just think of how hard our team battled and for it to end on the worst goal of my career, to happen in Game 7, is not acceptable.
Though the shot was one that Campbell would like back, goaltending was not the issue during the Maple Leafs collapse that kept them from their first playoff series victory since 2004.