Jim Hiller Insists He Sees 'Lots of Hope' As Maple Leafs Drop Fifth Straight At Home In Regulation For The First Time In 35 Years

Jim Hiller walked into the postgame scrum after another defeat and refused to frame the night as anything close to a moral victory. The Maple Leafs had once again played stretches that looked competitive against a strong opponent, only for the same fatal lapses to undo them. This time it was a fifth consecutive loss, all of them coming on a homestand that has grown increasingly bleak.

"I think it’s been like three of the last four or five where we probably played well enough, but it’s not good enough. Clearly," Hiller said. "So we can’t take moral victories in playing close and being there and losing. We’ve done that too many. Sometimes you can win a few and you can say, you know what, we played good, the puck didn’t bounce for you. Can’t do that."

The game-winner came from Minnesota’s Matt Boldy after a breakdown that Hiller traced to the neutral zone. He declined to assign individual blame, but made clear the sequence never should have reached the point it did. 

"We screwed that up in the neutral zone. To be honest with you, it shouldn’t have got to that point. Once it got to that point, it makes it hard. But we should have cleaned that up earlier."

Emotionally, Hiller wanted no part of an immediate post-loss solution session. 

"If we were to try to solve that right now, we probably wouldn’t do a very good job of it because everybody’s emotional and angry," he said. "So take a deep breath, watch the video, try to come up with strategy, and be better. That’s just it. I mean, like I said, I think we’ve been alright, but it’s not good enough."

Yet the coach kept returning to the same theme when asked about the broader picture. The Leafs had generated two early breakaways and shown stretches of the push they need. 

The Maple Leafs dropped their fifth consecutive game in regulation time at home, something they have not done since the 1990-91 season when the club was a team that consistently couldn’t make a 16-team playoff format in a league of 21 teams. 

Does Hiller still see hope in this group?

"Oh, I see lots. I see lots of hope. I see lots of hope. Yeah, yeah. I see lots of hope. I see it all over the place. I really do."

It was hardly convincing hearing it. But it’s not like they have much of a choice at the moment.

Maple Leafs captain Auston Matthews offered an assessment of better play that just gets undone by some mistakes that they need to fix. 

"Until that happens, I don’t know if the results are going to change," Matthews said. "We all got to look in the mirror and give a little bit more, and especially now when things kind of really turn or the adversity really hits. Making sure that we’re not hanging our heads or feeling sorry for ourselves because that’s just going to make it even worse."

William Nylander, who noted a miscommunication with Oliver Ekman-Larsson on the Boldy goal, said the team had been building in the right direction before the third goal. 

"I thought it was pretty good, to be honest," Nylander said of the overall effort. "We’ve got to build our character here within the team and work our way out of this."

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