The Numbers Don't Lie

Matthews scoring his 60th goal just one sign that NHL is enjoying an offensive renaissance

- By Damien Cox

With 60 goals this season, Auston Matthews has helped to make the Maple Leafs the third-highest scoring team in the league with 3.64 goals per game.

Call it the NHL’s post-COVID renaissance.

As the pandemic and its restrictions on our day-to-day lives have slowly retreated along with the prevaccine memories of NHL games played in empty arenas, offence and offensive superstars have suddenly become back in vogue. They are delivering statistics not seen in the world’s best professional hockey league since the latter part of the 20th century.

This time around, the Maple Leafs and the most prolific offensive player in the history of the franchise, Auston Matthews, are right at the forefront.

That’s different, at least for Leaf fans. The last time the NHL saw offensive numbers like this across the board over several seasons, the Leafs were a defensive-minded team under Pat Burns. Meanwhile, the wild days of the early 1980s, led by Wayne Gretzky and the runand-gun Edmonton Oilers, coincided with one of the darkest periods in Leafs history. That helped create the perception that Toronto was one of the NHL’s least enlightened organizations.

Nobody says that any more. The Leafs, as the third highest scoring team in the league with 3.64 goals per game, are one of the teams changing the modern NHL to a more offensive league.