Maple Leafs’ Keefe explains ‘uncomfortable’ process with his job on the line

NASHVILLE – Uncertain and uncomfortable.

These are the words Toronto Maple Leafs coach Sheldon Keefe returned to multiple times as he explained what life in career limbo was like during those long, restless days between Kyle Dubas’s firing and new general manager Brad Treliving giving him an endorsement.

“Obviously, I’m thrilled to be back. It’s been great to work with Brad,” Keefe said inside Bridgestone Arena, where he is happy to be sitting once again at the Maple Leafs’ draft table.

An excellent regular-season coach who has won just one of his five post-season series at the NHL level, Keefe must feel like he’s dodged a bullet.

He and Treliving had no previous relationship.

And as the days ticked by while the GM spoke to Leafs players and staff members about Keefe and exhaustively grinded through 17 hours’ worth of meetings with Keefe himself, all the vacant head coaching jobs in the league gradually got gobbled up. (The New York Rangers reportedly had some interest in Keefe, if he was fired, prior to hiring Peter Laviolette.)

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Despite feeling uncertain and uncomfortable, Keefe says Treliving’s diligent fire-or-retain process was thorough and necessary, given the delicate state of the organization and grand decisions that lie ahead.

Dubas has long been Keefe’s greatest supporter, first bringing him to the AHL, then the NHL, then extending him in the wake of 2021’s disastrous first-round exit to the underdog Montreal Canadiens.

Remember, when the Leafs lost out to the Tampa Bay Lightning in 2022, Dubas turned a blind eye to free-agent coaches such as Barry Trotz, Bruce Cassidy and Peter DeBoer. Instead, he proclaimed that one day, the younger Keefe would be held in similar regard.

Suddenly, Dubas was gone.

“I’m on the sidelines, right? It’s out of my control, and there’s a lot of things playing out there. Give Kyle his distance and let that process play out,” Keefe said. “I’ve worked with Kyle for a really long time, obviously, and he has been a massive part of my career.

“And I’ve grown tremendously working with him. He has done a terrific job to put our organization in a really good spot. Yet I’ve also worked without him in different times along the way, and I’ve enjoyed those as well.”

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Keefe expressed gratitude to club president Brendan Shanahan, who could have simply cleared house but instead gave Keefe a window to work with Treliving.

Both the boss and the employee see this stage of Keefe’s tenure behind the bench as “starting anew,” and Keefe says Treliving’s fresh perspective on the roster and its deployment will be healthy for the group.

Keefe says, like Dubas, Treliving is easygoing and fun to be around. He’s well respected in the league. The difference is that Treliving’s experience is more varied, having worked for different organizations.

Treliving appreciated how Keefe has gotten the Leafs’ star forwards to buy-in defensively and how the team has become a more committed group without the puck.

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“I respected, first of all, that he took the time and was that thorough,” Keefe said. “[He] showed me that he was serious about it.

“While uncomfortable at times in terms of some of the questions and the uncertainty for myself, he was easy to talk to and made it comfortable that way. And the more time you spend together, you get more and more excited about working with him.”

As for Keefe signing an extension before heading into the final season of his contract, the coach says that will play out in due time.

“We’ll talk about an extension,” Keefe said. “Just a lot of things on his list right now.”

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