This felt inevitable, didn’t it?
That Mitch Marner, the Golden Knight, would morph into a playoff-conquering superstar.
But what happens in Vegas really does stay in Vegas.
Marner’s performance this spring doesn’t change all that came before it in Toronto.
There are many truths (and myths) to the Marner postseason experience.
Marner never did this for the better part of nine postseasons as a Leaf.
Never performed like the best player on the ice repeatedly throughout a playoff series, never looked (and acted) like the rare and unique superstar he was during the regular season, the one who could shred foes on both ends of the ice.
The only real outlier was the 2018 playoffs when Marner, still just 20 and only in his second NHL season, dazzled the Boston Bruins with nine points in a seven-game first-round loss.
It all changed after that.
The tension grew and grew and grew with every series the Leafs didn’t win and that Marner didn’t perform like the star his team needed him (and paid him) to be, especially in the biggest moments.
He wasn’t alone, certainly.
His three fellow co-stars, Auston Matthews, William Nylander and John Tavares, also struggled to make their mark, some less so than Marner. But it was Marner who took the most blame, largely due to the controversial six-year contract extension he signed with the Leafs in the fall of 2019. His perception in the market forever changed after that, bubbling up again into fury with every postseason failure.
But it was something else too: More than Matthews, Nylander and Tavares, Marner just looked different in the playoffs.
The joy and freedom he exuded in racking up the sixth-most regular-season points in Leafs history disappeared, and in their place came a tighter, tenser version of Marner. One who was visibly burdened by the mounting pressure and scrutiny. One who was too stressed to hold the puck and make plays when the Leafs needed him to.
He put up points, sure, but the impact was duller than it needed to be.
Marner’s tenure with the Leafs was clouded by playoff disappointment. (Claus Andersen / Getty Images)
What’s stood out most about Marner’s run with Vegas this spring is just how free and in control he looks, with the results to match.
Marner entered his first conference final appearance in the NHL with more goals (seven) and points (18) than he ever had in any one of his nine postseasons with the Leafs.
He had five multi-point games in those first two rounds (12 games), one more than he had in his last four rounds (25 games) as a Leaf.
The playmaking has been spectacular at times, as it often is with Marner, but it’s the scoring that really pops offensively.
Marner once went 18 games — over the span of three postseasons — without scoring even once for the Leafs. He went his first 40 playoff games as a Leaf, for that matter, without scoring a single power-play goal.
Marner finally ended that drought in the 2023 playoffs with what proved to be his only power-play goal for the Leafs in the postseason. He already has two power-play goals for the Golden Knights in these playoffs.
His seven goals overall are one shy of the eight he had in his last 56 playoff games as a Leaf.
Hot shooting is part of the story, but so is a newfound level of calmness, coolness and confidence from Marner shooting pucks in big spots, most notably on the breakaway goal he scored in the first minute of a Game 6 closeout win over the Anaheim Ducks.
Marner never had a moment close to this as a Leaf, a moment of that magnitude when all the tools in his incredible toolbox shone through:
Nor did he have a game like that when the Leafs really needed it. (Marner added his second point in that second-round clincher on Vegas’ second goal of the night with a brilliant setup of Brett Howden’s short-handed marker.) Again, he was far from alone. But we’re talking about Marner here, and while the depth of his playoff struggles may have been overstated at times, the core premise wasn’t unearned.
The Leafs needed a lot more from him in the postseason. They needed what the Golden Knights are getting now.
Things are different for him in Vegas for a whole bunch of reasons.
The stakes for one thing. Marner is no longer trying to end decades of championship futility, at home, for the team he grew up rooting for. That burden is gone. And so is the scrutiny and pressure that came with it — and with being a Leaf, period.
There was no referendum on Marner when the Golden Knights went down 2-1 in their first-round series against Utah, like there would have been under similar circumstances in Toronto.
That was part of the appeal, it seemed, in his decision to join Vegas on an eight-year contract last summer.
Marner was also hopping aboard a team with snarl, a winning history and a roster full of proven playoff contributors. He didn’t have to be the guy for the Golden Knights, just one of many.
Marner joined a deep Vegas team with a winning history. (Rob Gray / Imagn Images)
And while Marner deserves only credit for crushing the Mammoth and Ducks, those two young and largely inexperienced opponents pale in comparison to the kind of squads he faced, and struggled to break through against, perennially with the Leafs — the Tampa Bay Lightning, Florida Panthers and Bruins most famously.
The Presidents’ Trophy-winning Colorado Avalanche will pose a much tougher test.
Truth is, Marner wouldn’t be playing for the Golden Knights right now if he had done this in the playoffs for the Leafs.
He would, almost certainly, still be a Leaf — and probably the most popular Leaf for that matter
In that alternate version of history, the Leafs almost certainly go on at least one deep playoff run. Maybe they reach the Eastern Conference final. Maybe they lose in the Stanley Cup Final. Maybe they actually win the franchise’s first Cup since 1967.
Marner would have been a hero in that world and would have had no reason to leave his team and city. And the complexion of the Leafs would be entirely different because of it.
If a breakthrough happened earlier than later, the Leafs probably wouldn’t let Kyle Dubas get away as general manager. Brendan Shanahan surely reaps the rewards for forever believing in Marner and the Core Four and continues as team president into the present. Sheldon Keefe might still be the Leafs coach.
It’s possible that all the recent chaos would never have happened. There may be no Brad Treliving, no Craig Berube, no John Chayka running the team with Mats Sundin. There would be no threat of Matthews leaving with two years still left on his contract.
But alas, that’s not what happened. Instead, it was Marner’s performance in the playoffs that spurred the criticism that led him to go elsewhere.
Would the breakthrough have come in Toronto had he stuck around last summer? After nine tries of mounting disappointment, it seems unlikely. Leaving was (likely) the only way this was going to happen for Marner.
He had to get away from Toronto, get away from being a Leaf, to reach his potential.
Marner is at a different point in his life now, too. He turned 29 earlier this month, he’s a father, an Olympian and the resident of a quiet community in Nevada. And he has all those playoff scars from his time with the Leafs.
His legacy will continue to evolve. It might eventually include the Stanley Cup, and even a Conn Smythe Trophy, if the Golden Knights can somehow upend the Avs in the Western Conference final.
What happened in Toronto still happened, though. What happens in Vegas stays in Vegas.
