Those four years the Maple Leafs won at least one playoff series, including their last conference final showing, were not forgotten when the first and second teams of the club’s Quarter Century all stars of the 2000s were announced Saturday night by the NHL.
Five of the 12 players had connections to the Pat Quinn-run teams that showed serious Stanley Cup aspirations before a seven-year freeze when the team didn’t make the playoffs, then eight more with just one series victory.
The current club’s core that’s threatening to break a slew of team regular season individual records in coming years and is working on a fourth consecutive 100-point season, made up five more of the names.
All 32 teams being revealed this month were chosen by national and local journalists, broadcasters and NHL.com writers who’ve covered their respective teams, in addition to select former players.
Toronto’s three first-team forwards, with no restriction to centre or wing, included franchise scoring leader Mats Sundin, whose final eight seasons covered the start of the 2000s. He had 575 of his 987 points this century. Hart, Calder and multiple Rocket Richard Trophy winner Auston Matthews rounds it out, joined by his right winger Mitch Marner, who currently leads Matthews in career points.
The two top defencemen are Tomas Kaberle, who ranks third in games played by Leaf blueliners at 878 and is sixth in franchise assists, plus Morgan Rielly, on schedule to pass Kaberle on the games chart next season.
Ed Belfour, who won 93 games in regular season and nine more in playoffs, edged Curtis Joseph for first-team netminder. Though Belfour played just three seasons (‘02 to ‘06), he compiled 17 shutouts, the most of any Toronto netminder in the quarter and was second in wins to only Frederik Andersen’s 149.
The second team selections feature Phil Kessel up front, who led the Leafs in scoring six times in lean years they were shut out of post-season action. That included at least 20 goals every season for Kessel and 30 on four other occasions as he racked up 394 points.
William Nylander, recently breaking into the top 10 of franchise scorers, is also there with John Tavares, who just passed 200 Toronto goals after joining the Leafs in 2018.
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The runner-up defence had Kaberle’s hard-shooting partner, Bryan McCabe, and Dion Phaneuf in front of Joseph. McCabe’s plus-63 is second-best of team defencemen in his span, while Phaneuf’s 45 goals matched Jake Gardiner, who like Andersen, also received some votes.
As the new century began, Joseph won 84 games with 11 shutouts, helping the Leafs past the Islanders and Senators to the ‘02 Eastern final where they lost in six games to Carolina.
Sundin, Matthews, Tavares and Phaneuf all served as team captains.
The six players voted to each first team will be on the ballot for the NHL All Quarter-Century Team that will be chosen via a fan vote that commences in February.
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