{"id":786218,"date":"2026-07-08T04:32:07","date_gmt":"2026-07-08T04:32:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/786218\/"},"modified":"2026-07-08T04:32:07","modified_gmt":"2026-07-08T04:32:07","slug":"bobrovsky-signing-gives-maple-leafs-best-shot-at-making-the-playoffs","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/786218\/","title":{"rendered":"Bobrovsky signing gives Maple Leafs ‘best shot at making the playoffs’"},"content":{"rendered":"

Bobrovsky could become the second coming of franchise-saving goalie like Ed Belfour<\/a>, who joined Toronto for the 2002-03 season at age 37. Belfour won a then-Maple Leafs record 37 games that season with a 2.26 goals-against average, .922 save percentage and seven shutouts to finish third in Vezina Trophy voting behind winner Martin Brodeur<\/a> and\u00a0Marty Turco<\/a>. He went 34-19-6 the following season with a 2.13 GAA, .918 save percentage and 10 shutouts that ranked second in the NHL behind Brodeur’s 11.<\/p>\n

Bobrovsky became as much a fixture in Sunrise, Florida, as the sunset. He left a two-time Stanley Cup champion (2024, ’25) and his 201 regular-season wins in seven seasons with the Florida Panthers third in the NHL behind Andrei Vasilevskiy<\/a> of the Tampa Bay Lightning (228) and Connor Hellebuyck<\/a>\u00a0of the Winnipeg Jets (228).<\/p>\n

“To be honest,” Bobrovsky said, “I thought I’m going to stay in Florida, but things work out like how they work out. The Leafs put their trust in me. In Florida this past season, we had lots of injuries. Our captain (Aleksander Barkov<\/a>) went down in our first practice and never played all year.”<\/p>\n

John Chayka, in his first season as Maple Leafs general manager, called Bobrovsky, who played no less than 50 games in every full season since 2021-22, “a real game-changer for us in terms of the stability, the consistency and the durability.” By Toronto standards, the past favors a goalie on the far side of 30. Walter \u00a0“Turk” Broda<\/a> was 35 in 1949 when the Maple Leafs won the Cup for the third consecutive season and still sharp at 37 when winning their fourth championship in five seasons.<\/p>\n

Maple Leafs owner Conn Smythe discovered Broda as a Detroit Red Wings farmhand in 1936 and said in 1950: “Broda is the greatest team player I ever had.” A decade later, coach\/general manager George “Punch” Imlach believed in Johnny “China Wall” Bower<\/a> even after he passed his 40th birthday.\u00a0<\/p>\n

“I always rated older players who have played in the NHL over those who have not,” Imlach said. “Bower was my prime example.”<\/p>\n

“I had a lot left in me, even after 40,” wrote Bower in his autobiography “The China Wall.”<\/p>\n

“I thrived on hard work, and I wanted to play every game \u00a0even though Punch had me spelled from time to time by Don Simmons<\/a> and Terry Sawchuk<\/a>.”<\/p>\n

Bower was 42 and still sharp when he helped Toronto to its last Stanley Cup title in 1967.<\/p>\n

This season, Bobrovsky has a chance to show his stuff.<\/p>\n

“What do the Leafs have with Bob?” Resch said. “They have a ‘chance.’ Sure, Toronto has gambled, but it’s still a good signing because Bob is their best shot to get back into the\u00a0
postseason.”<\/p>\n

NHL.com staff writer Mike Zeisberger contributed to this report<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Bobrovsky could become the second coming of franchise-saving goalie like Ed Belfour, who joined Toronto for the 2002-03…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":786219,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[556],"tags":[64,63,575,85],"class_list":["post-786218","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-nhl","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-nhl","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/786218","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=786218"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/786218\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/786219"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=786218"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=786218"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=786218"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}