The Toronto Maple Leafs have taken their first significant hit behind the scenes. The club announced the end of assistant coach Marc Savard, who was mainly in charge of the power play, one of the symbols of the current crisis.
Toronto is currently at the very bottom of the league in success. With a number of 13.3 percent, he is last in the NHL, which is difficult to defend for a team with such offensive talent. The decision came just a day after the Leafs finished the road trip without a single win and with a record of 0/10 in the numerical advantage.
Savard has been part of the implementation team since the summer of 2024, when the club brought in head coach Craig Berube. Savard worked with him in the past in St. Louis in the 2019/20 season. In Toronto, he was in charge of the offensive structure of the power forwards, which gradually fell apart.
The contrast with the past is striking. Even before Savard’s arrival, the Leafs’ power plays were among the best in the league for a long time. Although they worked solidly in his first season on the bench, they finished the regular season with a success rate of 24.8 percent (9th place in the NHL), but this year’s decline is dramatic.
According to information from the club, Toronto is not yet going to look for a replacement outside the organization and the solution will be temporarily internal. The change is primarily intended to send a signal that the situation has already gone too far.
At the same time, power plays were supposed to be the team’s main weapon. But captain Auston Matthews has only three goals this year in the numerical advantage. For comparison: two seasons ago he gave eighteen. His performances are under scrutiny and there is also speculation as to whether he is playing with ongoing health problems.
Without Mitch Marner, who has been a key element of power play combinations in the past, Toronto’s power play has lost the respect of opponents. Savard tried to involve players like Nicholas Robertson, Matias Maccelli or Nicolas Roy, but the desired effect did not appear. His system was built on quick puck movement and creativity, but in practice it was chaotic and toothless.
For Savard, it’s a tough end to a short engagement. As a player, he played over 800 NHL games, collected 706 points, and after the end of his career, he also had good results as a head coach in the OHL. He continues to be respected in the hockey environment and it is not excluded that he will reappear on the bench of one of the NHL clubs in the future.
But the tables turned in Toronto. The following weeks will show whether this is just a scapegoat or the first step to further changes.
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