{"id":587574,"date":"2026-04-07T07:44:08","date_gmt":"2026-04-07T07:44:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/587574\/"},"modified":"2026-04-07T07:44:08","modified_gmt":"2026-04-07T07:44:08","slug":"pete-deboer-just-proved-he-never-wanted-to-coach-the-maple-leafs","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/587574\/","title":{"rendered":"Pete DeBoer just proved he never wanted to coach the Maple Leafs"},"content":{"rendered":"<p id=\"inline-text-0\" class=\"mt-[18px] md:mt-0 mb-[18px] [&amp;_a]:text-blue my-f-1\" q:key=\"0\" q:id=\"5r\">News of the New York Islanders firing Patrick Roy and hiring Peter DeBoer sent shockwaves throughout the NHL. But, as always, the Toronto Maple Leafs are part of the discussion, even if tangentially.<\/p>\n<p id=\"inline-text-1\" class=\"my-[18px] [&amp;_a]:text-blue my-f-1\" q:key=\"0\" q:id=\"5u\">You might recall that earlier this season, the chatter surrounding the Leafs posited that Craig Berube was about to get the heave-ho. His <a href=\"https:\/\/editorinleaf.com\/maple-leafs-best-head-coach-candidate-just-became-available\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\">purported replacement was Peter DeBoer.<\/a><\/p>\n<p id=\"inline-text-2\" class=\"my-[18px] [&amp;_a]:text-blue my-f-1\" q:key=\"0\" q:id=\"5x\">DeBoer, who had been fired by the Dallas Stars following their embarrassing elimination at the hands of the Edmonton Oilers, publicly stated that he wasn\u2019t interested in returning to the NHL. <\/p>\n<p id=\"inline-text-3\" class=\"my-[18px] [&amp;_a]:text-blue my-f-1\" q:key=\"0\" q:id=\"60\">In fact, DeBoer was adamant about the fact that he wanted to remain focused on his role as an assistant coach with Team Canada at the Olympics.<\/p>\n<p id=\"inline-text-4\" class=\"my-[18px] [&amp;_a]:text-blue my-f-1\" q:key=\"0\" q:id=\"63\">Reports also surfaced that DeBoer had personally contacted Berube to reassure him that he wasn\u2019t trying to horn in on his job.<\/p>\n<p id=\"inline-text-5\" class=\"my-[18px] [&amp;_a]:text-blue my-f-1\" q:key=\"0\" q:id=\"66\">Well, how times change. DeBoer is now officially back in the NHL. While there\u2019s nothing wrong with the New York Islanders, the move just proves that DeBoer wasn\u2019t interested in coaching. He just wasn\u2019t interested in coaching the Maple Leafs. <\/p>\n<p id=\"inline-text-6\" class=\"my-[18px] [&amp;_a]:text-blue my-f-1\" q:key=\"0\" q:id=\"69\">There could be multiple reasons for this move. Perhaps DeBoer felt the Toronto media market was too much for him. Maybe he just didn\u2019t like the way management handled things. It could have been that he didn\u2019t get along with Brad Treliving or some of the higher-ups.<\/p>\n<p id=\"inline-text-7\" class=\"my-[18px] [&amp;_a]:text-blue my-f-1\" q:key=\"0\" q:id=\"6c\">Maybe it was all of the above. <\/p>\n<p id=\"inline-text-8\" class=\"my-[18px] [&amp;_a]:text-blue my-f-1\" q:key=\"0\" q:id=\"6f\">Whatever the case, seeing DeBoer head to Long Island, not just for the remainder of the season, but for the foreseeable future, suggests that DeBoer felt the situation in Toronto was a matter of, \u201cIt\u2019s not me, it\u2019s you.\u201d<\/p>\n<p id=\"inline-text-10\" class=\"my-[18px] [&amp;_a]:text-blue my-f-1\" q:key=\"0\" q:id=\"6l\">Perhaps that was the ultimate reason why <a href=\"https:\/\/editorinleaf.com\/craig-berube-s-maple-leafs-future-is-hanging-by-a-thread\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\">the Leafs held onto Berube<\/a> and only jettisoned Marc Savard. The club just couldn\u2019t find a suitable replacement for Berube. So, they kept him. The results were evident this season.<\/p>\n<p id=\"inline-text-11\" class=\"my-[18px] [&amp;_a]:text-blue my-f-1\" q:key=\"0\" q:id=\"6o\">As a final note, you have to admire the Islanders\u2019 guts for making a move, even at this point in the season. The team has four games to go and wasn\u2019t afraid of pulling the trigger.<\/p>\n<p id=\"inline-text-12\" class=\"my-[18px] [&amp;_a]:text-blue my-f-1\" q:key=\"0\" q:id=\"6r\">That\u2019s something the Maple Leafs should have done back in November or December. The team lacked the guts to make the move, so here we are, talking about how another organization has shown the Leafs how to take care of business.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"News of the New York Islanders firing Patrick Roy and hiring Peter DeBoer sent shockwaves throughout the NHL.&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":587575,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[433],"tags":[49,48,448,82],"class_list":{"0":"post-587574","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-nhl","8":"tag-ca","9":"tag-canada","10":"tag-nhl","11":"tag-sports"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/587574","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=587574"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/587574\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/587575"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=587574"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=587574"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=587574"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}