Sheldon Keefe and the Marlies Are More Exciting than the Leafs

For Sheldon Keefe, the past is just that. It's something he's moved on from. At 35 years old, Keefe is behind the bench for the Toronto Marlies, coaching in the American Hockey League for the first time following a respectable three-year run with the OHL's Sault Ste. Marie Greyhounds. Instead of focusing on the great strides he's made as a coach in professional hockey, though, many still associate Keefe with his controlling former agent David Frost, and former OHL teammate Mike Danton, who pleaded guilty and served prison time for hiring a hitman to have Frost killed.

His relationship with those two has been well documented, and it's not a topic Keefe wants to focus his energy on. "A lot has changed," he says, sitting ice-level at the Marlies' Ricoh Coliseum, now over a decade removed from the days he was heavily intertwined with Frost and Danton. As he speaks, his gaze is constantly drawn toward a freshly cleaned sheet of ice. He's on the biggest stage he's ever coached on and has moved forward once again, planting himself firmly in a hockey-mad market starving not just for a winner, but for a reason to believe.

It is on that sheet of ice where everything could change for Keefe and, as a result, the Toronto Maple Leafs. The new Maple Leafs brass has done a remarkable job at lowering expectations for this season—a good thing considering the predictably poor start the team is off to. New coach Mike Babcock has garnered a reputation for allowing touted young prospects to overripe in the AHL, and because of that, it's plausible that with William Nylander, Kasperi Kapanen and Connor Brow, the Marlies—off to a sizzling start—could offer a more entertaining season than the big club.

Keefe has spent his entire coaching career with young players and doesn't mince words about his new task. "We're going to stay focused on our primary purpose here, which is to develop these players," he says.

Keefe himself was once an impressionable young NHL player, having spent parts of three seasons with the Tampa Bay Lightning after scoring 121 points in his final junior season and playing his first NHL game at the age of 20. After being hired in June, Keefe got to work understanding not only what the position would entail but how he could impact the future of the Maple Leafs. He sat in on meetings with the Leafs brass and didn't view the complete overhaul the team had undergone as a challenge.

Whatever the Leafs and the Marlies were in the past was of no concern to him. Being able to start fresh, while surrounding himself with new people and different ideas was part of what made the new opportunity so enticing.

"The thing that was most appealing was that there was so much change and so many new people," he says. "The American Hockey League was going to become a focal point of the organization and not just a forgotten entity, but something they were going to care a lot about. They were going to work with me."

The result is a uniform approach that has seen both the Maple Leafs and Marlies utilize the same systems on the ice. Keefe spent his summer learning the ways of Babcock's intense, possession-heavy approach and was adamant before the season began that the Marlies would be "very much in line with what the Leafs are doing."

"The intent is that if a player gets called up tomorrow that the things we're accomplishing here day-to-day is in line with what's happening with the Leafs," he says. "If we as a staff can push our players to be worthy for a call-up, that's part of our job. The next part of our job is to make sure that when they arrive, they won't have a big adjustment period."

Keefe admits he's learned a lot from Babcock and will continue to do so. Since he began coaching Jr. A hockey in Pembroke, Ontario, soon after his playing days ended in 2005, he's been consistently learning the game all over again from behind the bench. Keefe says he "really had no idea" if he was any good at coaching when he started. He continued to be unsure if his coaching skills were up to snuff and didn't have any lofty professional goals. Kyle Dubas, the assistant general manager of the Leafs, then came calling and presented him with an opportunity to coach in Sault Ste. Marie.

Still, Keefe had his doubts.

"A lot of time when you're doing this coaching thing you don't really know if you're any good until people start to respond to you. First, your players have to respond and you might have success as a team. But then you start to get more calls and attention from say, Hockey Canada and only then you start to think, 'Well, hey, maybe I am pretty good at this.'"

It was when Keefe was able to hold his own against coaches he looked up to, including former Oshawa Generals and now Maple Leafs assistant coach D.J. Smith, that he believed he'd be coaching long term.

He'll now have to develop some of the most talented players he's ever had on his bench. And maybe, just maybe, restore some faith in the Leafs organization once again.

"Here we are in the American League," he says with a nostalgia-driven smile. "We'll find out early, but as the season moves along, we'll get a better sense if this is a level I can compete in and I'm confident I can."

After 13 games, the Marlies sit on top of the AHL's North Division with a 10-3-0 record and have scored more goals than any team in the league. They're adapting well to a possession-heavy style as their underlying metrics signal a team that can continue their strong play throughout the season.

And their leading scorer? None other than Nylander, with 14 points through 12 games.

So much of Babcock's initial address to the media after being hired this summer was focused on restoring pride to the Maple Leafs organization. Is Keefe, born in nearby Brampton and having played some of his junior hockey in Toronto, an extension of that pride? Is it important to instill a sense of hometown pride in this organization?

Keefe bristles at the notion of that pride affecting him on a personal level. He recognizes how important the organization is to the area. And for him, being back in the Greater Toronto Area evokes a different type of pride.

"My parents are still in Brampton," he says of the city just west of Toronto. "To be able to move closer to them is important. Having a level of family pride is important."

Indirectly then, Keefe is indeed following Babcock's orders to bring pride back to the organization. He may not be focused on representing the city of Toronto, but he is delivering the city something its been starved of and something that would certainly instill pride: a winning hockey club.

The Marlies are offering fans a more exciting brand of hockey than the Leafs right now. It may be too early to tell, but things have changed in Toronto. Expectations are different. And Keefe wants to be part of that change.

"I'm going to be here for the players," he says. "And help create great Maple Leafs."