Toronto: All or Nothing

[Victor 11,052]

 

This is part of an unofficial irregular series of Media Spots I'm doing which maps out certain themes for VHL franchises which have made them unique throughout their history. I've spoken about Seattle winning despite having few big superstar names, even in the past, but especially under long-serving GM Blake Campbell. For New York, I talked about how their rise and fall over the decades means that their life resembles a bell curve, although an increasingly lopsided one, as its current right side is becoming significantly long than the left. I've stuck with the old franchises in part because it's a comfort zone for me, in part because there's more to draw on and talk about, but primarily because it's easier to show a clear picture. For some of our newer teams, the theme might change within a single generation because of the small sample size; for instance, had I written about London in S87 I would be talking about how they had failed to win a playoff series in 15 seasons, and look quite foolish after they won the championship in S88 and went on to nearly claim two more in quick succession.
 

So we're sticking with the old this time and it's a grand old team in the Toronto Legion, one of two in the whole league to have never changed its name from S1 until today. Better yet, the Legion encapsulate the sentiment in that opening paragraph – it will take a lot to change the narrative because no matter how good or bad the times are, that's just how the Legion do things. It's all or nothing and it always has been.
 

Toronto has certainly lived up to its location – the largest city of a hockey crazed country, high on expectations which are not always matched by results. Of the eight original VHL franchises, the Legion were the sixth to win their first Continental Cup, despite high profile attempts to do so sooner. Christian Stolzschweiger and Maxim Desny were two of the names brought in to try to lead Toronto to the top but without much playoff success. Scotty Campbell spent his last two seasons in Toronto, a spell reminiscent of the latter half of Wayne Gretzky's career – continued individual success not matched by the rest of the team. When finally it all came together, fittingly a year after Campbell's retirement, the Legion had to stack the team with superstars from Kevin Brooks and Mike Szatkowski to Jochen Walser and Alex Gegeny. It was a deserved win in S9 but it seemed to set the precedent – for the Legion to win, they'd have to be the absolute best and even then they might die trying.
 

It's a trend that's stood the test of time. When the Legion are good, they are great. They've made 3 straight finals on three separate occasions (S20-S22, S36-S38, and S48-S51, the latter being an even rare 4-season streak). The first of those was part of a 7-season playoff streak by the team built by David Knight – one with the likes of Aidan Shaw, David Walcott, Lars Berger, and James Bencharski, which came with great expectations after the S18 super draft and really should have led to more than 1 Continental Cup. The last of those was of course during the VHL's first ever threepeat (and so nearly the only fourpeat) which looking back always seems like a no-brainer – how could anyone else compete with a core of Max Molholt, Zach Parechkin, Hans Wingate, and Black Velvet? And their most recent championships have also all been won in specific peaks, with a repeat in S64 and S65 (the relative underdog nature of that run notwithstanding) and then the S91 cup coming in the midst of a 6-season playoff streak including 3 trips to the finals.
 

In between Toronto tends to underachieve. Even newer members will be familiar that the S91 Continental Cup triumph came after years of trials and tribulations, specifically 25 straight seasons without even a finals appearance, the joint second-longest such drought in VHL history (and the fourth, now fifth-longest ever cup drought). That was pretty extreme even by the Legion's standards but there have always been dry spells – between the mid-30s run and the threepeat a decade later, between the threepeat and the 60s repeat, and going back to the start, from the first championship in S9 to the long-awaited second in S21. No one does the highest highest and lowest lows quite like Toronto.
 

To illustrate that last point perfectly, we need to just look at the single season team records over the years. The Legion have two of the 13 60+ win seasons in VHL history, in S10 and S22. Fittingly both came immediately after a Continental Cup and both ended in finals heartbreak despite being the favourites. But the Legion also have the season with the most losses in history (69 in S11 – immediately after one of the greatest seasons ever), with S5 and S60 only two losses behind. This continues through various statistics: the highest ever goal differential (+237 in S10) followed by the lowest ever (-306 in S11). Two seasons, out of 10 ever, of 400 or more goals (S5 and S11) and also one of the best defensive seasons with just 115 goals against in S51. But also the two lowest points totals of all time – 10 in S11 and a measly 9 in S60. The duality of Toronto never ceases to amaze.
 

It should therefore come as no surprise that the Legion followed up two straight finals appearances, including a very impressive Victory Cup in S94, by making a high-profile goaltending trade and missing the playoff entirely in S96. They're embroiled in a tight playoff race with New York this season and will be hopeful that the Americans' fortunes don't finally turn after four decades of pain, but it feels like if they aren't at the top already, the season is probably a write-off. The only championship season I didn't mention here, S29, illustrates that in a way. It doesn't fit the theme perfectly because it wasn't a star-studded team and most importantly, it was a flash in the pan, having missed the playoffs immediately before and immediately after. Despite that though, it was a Victory and Continental Cup double for Toronto. Because even at their most random, the Legion retain one key quality – it's either all or nothing.