Matthews rallies to Marner's defence, refusing to see him traded!
The burden for the Toronto Maple Leafs' failure to win a first-round series this postseason has rested squarely on Auston Matthews and Mitch Marner. Toronto has now lost seven consecutive postseason series and eight consecutive games in which it had a chance to eliminate an opponent. Since 2018, the core of Matthews, Marner, and William Nylander has accumulated seven points.
Matthews cannot believe that some people think Leafs management would break up such a great group of players, would give up on a great teammate like Marner. This is what he had to say on the idea that Leafs forwards, particularly Marner, may need to split up:
«Mitch is an unbelievable player, he's an unbelievable teammate. In this room, everybody loves Mitch; everybody loves everybody. We really have a tight bond. All the noise coming from the outside, you guys have fun with that.»
However, Matthews' teammates did mention during their respective press conference that they expect changes to come.
Marner himself was asked about that possibility - the Leafs breaking up the core - and answered this, started by complimenting his general manager Kyle Dubas, maybe to get him on his side.
«We have an unbelievably talented general manager.
«Everyone just wants to get into panic mode and do stuff and try to change something up, but I think they (management) have a lot of confidence in our team. It's up to them to decide what they want to do. We all know how much talent we have.»
Credit: HockeyFeed
| POLL | ||
Will Matthews and Marner get split? | ||
| Yes | 81 | 60.9 % |
| No | 52 | 39.1 % |
| List of polls | ||
