Is Auston Matthews having the best season by any Toronto Maple Leaf, ever?

Auston Matthews for FanDuel promo and DraftKings promo 4.17

Credit: Auston Matthews (© John E. Sokolowski-USA TODAY Sports)

William Nylander shrugged, flashing his usual “What do you want from me?” smile.

“He’s the best goal scorer in league. I don’t know what else to tell you.”

Yes, we know. And we know that you know, William. But even by Auston Matthews’ standard…he’s finding new ways to top himself seemingly every night this season.

Matthews pacing the league in goals is obviously nothing new. Barring an injury or a late charge from the Florida Panthers’ Sam Reinhart, Matthews will run away with his third Rocket Richard Trophy in the last four seasons. But even for him…it feels like he’s somehow found a way to level up.

In the second period of the Leafs’ 4-3 overtime win over the Philadelphia Flyers Thursday night: bang, bang, bang. Matthews buried a natural hat trick in *checks notes* 7:49, the first and third on his patented laser wrister, the second on a bad-angle one timer.

“They’re a really stingy team, they play really hard both sides of the puck…so it’s just sticking with it, staying patient, trying to work them shift after shift, eventually getting those opportunities and capitalizing on them,” Matthews said.

Not only did it give him 45 goals in 51 games, it gave him five hat tricks on the year. For perspective: off-season signing Max Domi has five goals. Tyler Bertuzzi has six. Matthews has departed Planet Earth.

“We know by now he’s an exceptional player,” said Leafs coach Sheldon Keefe. “The year he got 60, that tear he was on towards the end of the season, it seems like he’s been on that all season to this point. So it’s exceptional. There’s not much else to say. Game changing tonight.”

Still stating the obvious? Maybe. Matthews is pretty clearly the greatest raw talent in team history. After longtime teammate Mitch Marner assisted on two of Matthews’ goals Thursday, the duo set a franchise record for the most goals involving two teammates with 211. They are 26 years old.

But is Matthews outdoing every other individual Leaf performance, ever, including his own previous bests, this season? Is he in the midst of the greatest single season performance in the franchise’s 106-year history?

The Leafs haven’t played in a Stanley Cup Final, let alone won the Cup, since 1967, of course, but they still have plenty of noteworthy individual campaigns on the books. Charlie Conacher led the NHL in goals five times in a six-year span between 1930-31 and 1935-36. In 1970-71, at 41 years old, Jacques Plante set an NHL single-season record with a .944 save percentage. Darryl Sittler’s 1975-76 season included an NHL record 10 points in one game, and he delivered a 111-point effort two seasons later. Doug Gilmour compiled a franchise-record 127 points and won the Selke Trophy in 1992-93. Many consider that season the best wire to wire by any Leaf, especially when they came within one win of reaching the Stanley Cup Final. And of course, Matthews is up against himself. When he buried 60 goals in 73 games in 2021-22, he became the first Leaf to win the Hart Trophy in 67 years.

This year: He’s currently tracking for 72 goals. No player has hit that mark since Teemu Selanne and Alexander Mogilny buried 76 apiece in 1992-93. They were the sixth and seventh players to join the 70-goal club, which also includes Phil Esposito, Wayne Gretzky, Jari Kurri, Bernie Nicholls and Brett Hull. By virtue of being becoming the eighth, Matthews would lay claim to the greatest Leaf season. He’d also be hitting the mark in a lower-scoring NHL season than any other 70-goal scorer played in.

The eye-popping numbers stand out, but it’s the context that makes Matthews’ season really special. When he scored 60 two seasons ago, he did so on a stacked team that set franchise records in wins with 54 and points with 115. They had six 20-goal scorers and 12 players reaching double figures in goals. They iced one of the NHL’s best defensive teams on top of ranking near the top of the league in most offensive categories.

This year? It’s no secret the Leafs have been an adventure defensively, grading out as one of the leakiest 5-on-5 teams in the league. Their scoring depth has evaporated. Matthews, Marner, William Nylander and John Tavares have accounted for a staggering 60.6 percent of Toronto’s goals. In the Leafs’ past 30 games? Matthews alone has scored 31 times. Nylander, Marner and Tavares have combined for 36 over that span. Every other Leaf: 43. Matthews’ effort Thursday was a microcosm of the season. He carried his flawed team to victory.

Nathan MacKinnon has been the most dominant player in the league for most of this season. Nikita Kucherov will be the first to hit 100 points. Connor McDavid is still pretty clearly the greatest hockey talent of the past three decades. But Matthews’ 2023-24 Hart Trophy case gets stronger by the day. Where would this team be without him? That question feels scarier than it has any other time in his eight NHL seasons.

The story isn’t written yet. A lot can change over the Leafs’ final 30 games. But what Matthews is doing in 2023-24 has never been done in a Maple Leafs sweater – not even by him.

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Is Auston Matthews having the best season by any Toronto Maple Leaf, ever?

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