The Toronto Maple Leafs are back in the playoffs again, looking for their first series win since 2004 again, and probably will find a way to lose again, because the playoffs always brings a bigger emphasis on goaltending and Toronto’s first-round challenge is taking on Andrei Vasilevskiy after a season in which the Leafs have used Ilya Samsonov, Matt Murray, Joseph Woll, Erik Kallgren, and even for a hot minute, Jett Alexander.
The 2003-04 Maple Leafs come up a lot because they were a good enough team to actually win one (1) playoff series. They were also, at the time, record setters with the highest regular-season points total in Leafs history at 103. They’ve surpassed that figure three times since, including this year, but not yet appeared in a conference semifinal, or division final, or whatever they want to call the second round nowadays.
Pretty good team, won a playoff round… doesn’t really capture it. Who was on the 2003-04 Maple Leafs?
Five Hall of Famers, for one thing. Largely winding down their careers, but still five Hall of Famers: Ed Belfour, Ron Francis, Brian Leetch, Joe Nieuwendyk, and captain Mats Sundin. Really, it should be six Hall of Famers, because Alexander Mogilny was there, too, plus a Masterton Trophy winner in Gary Roberts. And that’s just the guys on the ice because the coach was also a Hall of Famer, Pat Quinn.
Then there were five guys who aren’t Hall of Famers, but were solid NHLers, dudes who played 1,000 or more games in the league, the kind of fellas you’re going to want on your side in the playoffs: Tie Domi, Tom Fitzgerald, Calle Johansson, Bryan McCabe, and Matt Stajan.
It should’ve been more than five guys with 1,000 games, but remember that the NHL, reacting to the Maple Leafs winning a playoff series (not really, it wasn’t that rare at the time), canceled the entire 2004-05 season. Four more 2003-04 Leafs played at least 900 NHL games, but not 1,000: Tomáš Kaberle, Ken Klee, Bryan Marchment, and Darcy Tucker.
Even the list of players from this team who were just dudes… is pretty solid. This team had Nik Antropov, Wade Belak, Alexei Ponikarovsky, Robert Reichel, and The Other Guy From The Legion Of Doom Mikael Renberg.
The 2003-04 Leafs were a flawed team with most of its biggest names not in their prime, but what a collection of hockey talent in one place at one time. If they ever win another playoff series, will it be as much fun to look at that roster two decades later? We’ll see. Maybe.
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