Good morning Toronto Maple Leafs fans, and people who got lost on their way to syrup and lawn care forums!

Big news in Leafs land, as the much maligned goalie coach Steve Briere has been let go by the organization:

Maple Leafs parting ways with goalie coach Steve Briere after seven seasons

Will this help or hinder the Leafs? Briere has worked with the following goalies who got game time in the NHL with Toronto:

Jack Campbell
Petr Mrázek
Erik Källgren
Joe Woll
Michael Hutchinson
David Rittich
Kasimir Kaskisuo
Frederik Andersen
Garrett Sparks
Curtis McElhinney
Calvin Pickard
Jhonas Enroth
Antoine Bibeau
Jonathan Bernier
James Reimer

That’s just a list. What you do with the information is completely up to you.

Now, firing the coach isn’t going to make the Leafs goaltending fantastic, since the starting pair under contract is Petr Mrázek and Erik Källgren. This does give the Leafs the ability to consult with their current goalies, and maybe a new free agent goalie about the new goalie coach. Someone they’ve worked with before, perhaps?

Anyway, speaking of goalies; while I was at the Elite Prospects page for Briere, I saw a Division 3 team in France needs one. Pays $10k and they provide academic support.

Elite Prospects Jobs

Oh, speaking of goalies!

Six potential value goalies for Maple Leafs, Oilers to consider

Anyone besides me want an Alex Nedeljkovic?

Then I was scrolling through Twitter because I hate myself and saw this tweet from the OHL:

I immediately thought “Hey, a former Leaf, good job.” Then I got confused about Steve Staios and whether he had been a Leaf or not. He was, just not as a player. After retiring from the Long Island Islanders in 2012 he joined the Leaf as a consultant with player development and spent a little bit of time behind the bench in 2015.

He left the Leafs to take over his hometown Hamilton Bulldogs as President in 2015 and named himself GM in 2016. The Bulldogs won the OHL Championship in 2018 and are currently losing the finals 2-1 to the Windsor Spitfires.

What a journey that was!

There was an Eastern Conference Final game on last night, at the end of the second period it was tied 1-1, but I’m not staying up for the end so someone give the final score in the comments. The series was tied 2-2. Who’s winning now? I don’t know.

[SPECIES: Surprise! The Bolts won. You can read more about it here.]

It’s Friday, so if you celebrate that sort of thing happy Friday! If you work weekends, well, uh, sorry.

I’m going to be up in Toronto this weekend, so if you see me say hi! If you don’t know what to look for, that’s a you issue.

From The Branches