ANAHEIM, Calif. – It may be as direct and accurate an answer as coach John Tortorella has given during his brief tenure as coach of the Vegas Golden Knights.
“That narrative is a bunch of (expletive),” he said Saturday at the team hotel about the past perception of star forward Mitch Marner not being able to rise to the occasion in the playoffs.
Tortorella is right, and it’s not just because Marner is on fire, leading the league in postseason points this year with 13 and coming off his first playoff hat trick in a dominant Game 3 win over the Ducks at Honda Center on Friday night to take a 2-1 lead in the best-of-seven series.
To be fair, it didn’t come from nowhere. It does, however, deserve a bit of examination.
The Maple Leafs didn’t have a ton of postseason success with Marner driving the bus. And while his point-per-game average dropped from 1.13 in the regular season to 0.90 in the playoffs, the fact his defensive metrics improved at a similar rate suggest that may have been more of a game-flow issue than anything else.
Marner never scored more than three goals in a single postseason with Toronto, a mark he matched on Friday alone.
But most of the criticisms and ridicule of Marner have actually been focused on strictly his Game 7 performances, which to be fair, haven’t been great. Toronto went 0-6 in six winner-take-all postseason games, and Marner was limited to two assists and a minus-7 rating in those contests.
That’s not good.
Still, it’s an incredibly small sample size. And sorry to bring this debate into it, but there’s no such thing as clutch.
Players are called clutch when they succeed and chokers when they don’t. Sometimes that can be the same player from one game to the next. Kobe Bryant, for example, shot 34 percent in the final two minutes of playoff games on shots to tie or take the lead. Right around league average in those situations. We just remember the makes with such fondness that it felt much better than that.
Alex Ovechkin was widely considered a postseason choker until the Capitals hoisted the Stanley Cup.
Funny how that works.
So is it more likely that Marner all of a sudden flipped a switch and went from choker to postseason stud or that the narrative was silly from the beginning?
Marner isn’t going to answer it. He expertly spoke around the question in talking to both local media and on the TNT postgame show where he was really pressed about it on Friday night, insisting his focus is on just doing his part to win.
Others were willing to go to bat for him, though.
“You guys don’t see the stuff he does,” Tortorella said. “The people here and the people in Toronto. All the people who talk about this guy, they don’t see any of the things he brings to a game even if he doesn’t score a goal. I’ve known that coaching against him.
“And Mitch doesn’t care. He’s a pro and a terrific player, one of the top players in this league. And he plays for us.”
The Golden Knights are certainly happy he does. Not only did he have two goals and an assist in the closeout game against Utah in the first round, but he starred in Friday’s pivotal win to swing the second-round series in the Knights’ direction. His two multi-goal games match the number of times he did that in 70 postseason games with Toronto.
“We all know his past and everyone is hard on him about his playoff performances, but he’s proven people wrong and throwing a hatty in there is a nice touch,” defenseman Ben Hutton said. “We’re happy for him, and we’re glad he’s on our side.”
Just don’t expect Maple Leafs fans to easily accept that maybe they were the problem.
A major Toronto blog on Saturday published a piece suggesting Marner’s success is only due to the relative weakness of the Western Conference as teams like the Mammoth and Ducks would not even have qualified in the East with their point totals.
Neither would the Knights for that matter. But that’s a wild contortion to avoid the reality that Marner is thriving in a new environment.
Just like Jack Eichel declining to acknowledge the narrative ever existed about Marner.
“I don’t know what the doubters are saying,” Eichel said. “Obviously, he’s a world-class player and he’s been a huge part of our team from the start of the season. He’s rolling right now, and it’s been awesome to see.
“But in terms of doubters, I’m not sure what everyone is saying and I’m not really sure he cares. He’s the type of guy who just goes about his business every day and brings a good attitude to the rink. I think you could see last night in a game like that where’s he’s feeling it, just how special a player he is. So as teammates, you’re so happy for him and we love to see him have that success. He’s such a big part of our group.”
As hard as that might be for Maple Leafs fans and Toronto media to see.
And, oh by the way, since the 2020 playoffs, the Maple Leafs were never outscored at five-on-five with Marner on the ice during the playoffs. They were, however, dominated when he was off the ice.
They are also watching the postseason at home and preparing to pick first overall in the draft after trading Marner away.
How’s that for a narrative?
Contact Adam Hill at ahill@reviewjournal.com. Follow @AdamHillLVRJ on X.
