Keefe's postgame comments indicative of a coach who knows he's done
Sheldon Keefe upset with how the Maple Leafs choked away the series against Boston. His post-game comments were indicative of a coach who knows he may be fired.
It was too little, too late, as they say, for the Toronto Maple Leafs, who were the superior team through the final 3 games against the Boston Bruins in Round 1. Unfortunately, the margin for error was small and after opening the scoring in Game 7 in the 3rd period, the Leafs fell into old habits and allowed the Bruins to not only tie the game 1:21 after they took the lead, but they also gave the Bruins an inch in OT and the Bruins took a mile.
David Pastrnak was the hero for Boston after being called out by his coach Jim Montgomery following Game 6, and for the Leafs, Mitch Marner blew his coverage, letting up on Pastrnak just enough to allow him to surge through the neutral zone and into the Leafs' zone to pick up the dump in off the wall and beat a sprawling Ilya Samsonov clean.
In Sheldon Keefe's mind, it was the old habits that cost his team the game, and during his post-game media scrum, he felt as though the Bruins didn't beat the Leafs. In his mind, the Leafs beat themselves.
It's very evident that teams play the Leafs, they set up the game for the Leafs to beat themselves and I thought we did that in Game 3 and 4. We beat ourself with how we played at home."
Does this not sound like a coach who knows that he's going to be out of a job soon? Just with the way he spoke about the Leafs as an outsider for a moment, it made it seem like he was aware of what is likely coming this summer.
| POLL | ||
MAI 5 | 1352 ANSWERS Keefe's postgame comments indicative of a coach who knows he's done Will the Leafs fire Sheldon Keefe after his 1st round loss to Boston? | ||
| Yes, he's done | 1211 | 89.6 % |
| No, he'll be back | 141 | 10.4 % |
| List of polls | ||
