Power outage: With extra skater, Leafs aren’t getting it done

The Toronto Maple Leafs power play was one of the worst in the NHL heading into Saturday’s game against St. Louis, but it got worse from there, as the Buds went 0-for-4 with the man advantage as they lost 4-2 to the Blues. The Leafs’ power play now sits at 7.89 percent efficiency, an almost comically awful number that lays bare how feckless Toronto is with the man advantage. So, what’s the solution?

Well, if we were certain about how to fix the PP, the Leafs would be employing us and not assistant coach Marc Savard to run it. But we’re always happy to chime in with some constructive criticism – and in this case, there’s a lot of constructing that coach Craig Berube needs to do with this element of his special teams’ play.

From our perspective, it all comes down to the personnel – and given that Toronto can’t do anything right with the PP, it’s high time for a shock to the system. Maybe that means playing worker-bee left winger Steven Lorentz to get pucks out of the corners and use his physical frame in front of the net to cause chaos and allow regular PP members Auston Matthews and Mitch Marner to work their magic. Maybe that means bringing back healthy scratch Nick Robertson and using his speed and skill to amp up the Buds’ play with the extra man. Maybe it means giving more PP minutes to stellar left winger Matthew Knies, who’s been averaging 2:09 on the man-advantage, but who definitely could play more on the PP.

If you’re thinking those suggestions may not work, you could be correct – but at this stage, the Leafs’ PP can’t sink any lower, right? They’re going to have an opportunity to fix it Sunday against Minnesota, and the Wild are the third-worst team in the league on the penalty-kill (66.67 percent efficiency). If Toronto can’t generate offense against Minnesota, then bigger changes than the ones we’ve proposed above may be in order.

The amount of talent the Leafs have on offense is what makes their failure on the PP so frustrating. It shouldn’t look this difficult to produce goals on the man advantage but Toronto currently has enough trouble just breaking into the offensive zone, let alone producing high-quality shots in and around their opponents’ net. It’s baffling, but it’s the reality in Leafs Land, and nothing short of a major turnaround will take the heat off Leafs brass.

Savard and Berube need to fix the PP and fix it quickly. They’re in the middle of the Atlantic Division in no small part because they’re hapless with the extra man. It’s astonishing that they’re not even at the 10 percent efficiency level with this type of talent, but they’ve earned the critiques that are coming their way now. Whether it’s superstars like Matthews, Marner and William Nylander, or pluggers like left winger Bobby McMann or center Max Domi, Leafs players have to own their current predicament, and come up with a solution that will boost their overall attack.

Obviously, you don’t have to score every time out on the power play. You don’t even have to score three times for every 10 power plays. But with this Toronto team, you certainly should be a top-10 PP team, as the Leafs were last year when they were seventh overall at nearly 24 percent.

The Buds have to look inward, as there’s no trade out there that’s going to fix their PP. And if they can’t figure out a solution, bigger questions will be coming soon.

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