I think the blame lies in 3 areas:
- Keefe
- Dubas
- Matthews & Marner's approach.
Keefe - Observed that Phillip Danault was getting the better of Auston Matthews. I believe it was the first Boston playoff series where Matthews basically got used as a sacrificial lamb. He'd go out against the Bergeron line and get shut down / beaten. As a result, JvR-Bozak-Marner put up some pretty big numbers.
Even without JT, the Leafs could have very easily used Matthews as a sacrificial lamb. They had a good thing going with Galchenyuk-Kerfoot-Nylander. Take Marner and put him with Foligno & Spezza.
The Oilers learned this lesson as well -- most teams, if they really want to shut down 1 guy in the playoffs, or 1 line, they can do it. The key as a coach is adapting, and making sure that if you're not going to win the "Line 1 matchup" -- you better win the lines 2 & 3 matchups. Rather than doing this, Keefe started stacking the big 3 together like he did last year with Columbus, rather than separating them out over 3 lines and trusting in the fact that eventually somebody on Montreal was going to make a mistake, and you want one of the big 3 out there when it happens.
Montreal decided they were going to collapse and not let any high-danger passes get through cleanly. High-danger passes are literally how Matthews, Marner, and Nylander score the vast majority of their goals. Putting them together neutralizes all 3, rather than 1 on each line, with some guys who are able to score dirty goals.
Further on the bash Keefe train... his "usage" of his bottom 6. Mikheyev played 13:22, including 12:04 at even strength. Engvall played 12:01, including 11:44 at even strength. Jason Spezza played 11:44, but only 9:28 at even strength. Why it took until the 3rd period of game 7 to recognize that Spezza was worthy of a regular shift is absolutely flabbergasting. The guy was playing great, he's desparate, can both shoot & pass, and he paced at 45 points over a full season.
Dubas - Dubas was dealt a very tough hand with respect to the salary cap, but it was of course his own doing with the size of the contracts he gave out. He deserves a ton of credit for the Brodie signing... but the depth pieces he acquired were basically all flops.
- Plays died on Joe Thornton's stick.. .literally he was dragging down Spezza for most of the season, and a good chunk of the series.
- The Leafs "big july 1 acquisition" was Wayne Simmonds for $1.5m. They got 9 points out of him over 45 games, and 1 assist in the playoffs. Montreal got Corey Perry for half of that salary, and delivered 9 goals, 21 points in 49 games, along with 2 goals & 4 points in the playoffs. Imagine if the Leafs had a Corey Perry battling infront of the net against Montreal.
- Ilya Mikheyev & Pierre Engvall did very little all season, and absolutely nothing in the series.
- Vesey, Boyd also insignificant.
You look at the group that finished the season as the "bottom 6" -- Simmonds at $1.5m, Thortnon at $700k, Spezza at $700k, Engvall at $1.25m, Mikheyev at $1.65m... it's a pretty sad state of affairs when you can only really be excited about the prospect of 1 of them returning at their current contract (Spezza).
Matthews & Marner - These are 2 guys who basically set the division on fire with Marner carrying the pick and finding Matthews. Matthews went out and got phyiscal, thinking that's what he needed to do -- so I give him credit there... but at some point, they needed to have a sit down and figure out how to "do things differently". If they were going to be stuck together, let Matthews carry the puck and look for Marner. No, it's not their "forte" -- but it is something that Montreal may not know how to defend.