Who the Toronto Maple Leafs need to step up during the playoffs

The Toronto Maple Leafs have clinched their seventh-straight playoff spot, but for this team, that has never been the focus this year. All eyes are on if they can finally get that first playoff series victory since 2004, or maybe even their first Stanley Cup since 1967, but they’re going to need all hands on deck to do that.

Frank Seravalli went over who he thinks is going to be the big x-factor for this year’s Leafs team come playoff time on Daily Faceoff Live.

Frank Seravalli: Their X-factor is Ryan O’Reilly. It’s really simple: when I look at this team and the playoff failures and issues that they’ve had in years past, I just think back to the press conference that team president Brendan Shanahan had when he said “We don’t have any killers.” They needed a stone-cold killer, and they went out and got one in a Conn Smythe trophy winner as playoff MVP in Ryan O’Reilly.

The struggle has been that he’s played eight games with the Leafs since coming over and broke his finger. He’s working his way back, he’s been participating with the Leafs on this road trip and practice, and he’s certainly getting closer. They’re going to monitor that to make sure that he’s at 100% so that they don’t end up with a re-injury.

But I think he’s such a critical piece, and it’s not just for what they gave up for him for this run in a first-, second-, third-, and fourth-round pick, it’s also for the different intangibles that he brings to this group. He came out of the gate hot just after the trade, he went his last five games before the injury without any points, without getting on the scoresheet at all, and he was brought in to be this team’s X-factor in the playoffs, make no mistake about it.

I think he can touch so many different facets of the game, the key is which Ryan O’Reilly are you getting? Are you getting the guy that looked so good in his first couple games in the lineup? Are you getting the guy that was closer to the 2019 Conn Smythe and Selke trophy winning season? Or are you getting the Ryan O’Reilly that we saw through the first 50 games of the year, essentially before the trade with the St. Louis Blues in which he really didn’t look like himself, and struggled at times? It’s been a tough year for him, so for me the X-factor is 100% Ryan O’Reilly.

You can watch the full episode here…