Dave Feschuk: In an NHL with two different seasons, the Maple Leafs appear to be built for the wrong one

Looking back on how the Maple Leafs approached this past season, maybe the method seemed logical enough. They had spent the bulk of previous seasons mixing flashes of eye-popping promise with stretches of uninspired play. Maybe, the management team posited, it was that chronic unevenness that explained Toronto’s disappointing succession of playoff performances. They were a swaggering squad that always seemed to be waiting to flip the proverbial switch. And then, without fail, the lights went out.

So general manager Kyle Dubas and head coach Sheldon Keefe brainstormed an alternate approach: By demanding a superior level of regular-season consistency, they hoped to be better prepared for a post-season breakthrough.

“Every single year we’ve made the playoffs we’ve also had stretches in the year where we’ve hindered our position going in,” Dubas said. “In order for us to give ourselves the best success (in the playoffs), we have to focus on the day-to-day and building the mindset and habits that are going to serve us when we get there.”

With the Leafs about a month removed from another first-round elimination, you know how that plan turned out. They spent the 56-game regular season as models of dependability. They racked up points in the standings at a rate that would have translated to a franchise-record 112 points in a typical 82-game regular season. They finished first in the North Division with relative ease. And in the end, it added up to … nothing.

A lot of that is on the players. There’s no excusing the Leafs’ failure to deliver the appropriate knockout punch after building a 3-1 series lead against the Montreal Canadiens. And good luck to management in the ongoing search for the missing killer instinct.

But a good portion of the blame falls on management, too, given how the entire premise of the this season’s operation was flawed. Correcting perennial post-season underperformance by optimizing regular-season habits and standards might make sense in a league where the post-season and the regular season bear at least a slight resemblance. But as these playoffs have reminded us yet again, the NHL isn’t that league.

Witness the Canadiens, who finished 18th of 31 teams in the overall standings, readying to play against the Tampa Bay Lightning in Monday’s Game 1 of the Stanley Cup final. Montreal general manager Marc Bergevin always insisted his team was designed for the playoffs, built as it was around a group of hulking defencemen, a relentlessly conscientious defensive style and the kind of magical goaltending that’s largely unsustainable over a six-month slog. Bergevin’s only problem was that the Canadiens almost weren’t good enough in the regular season to prove their GM right.

Don’t get it wrong: It’s not just Dubas and Keefe who’ve failed to recognize the essential pointlessness of hockey’s regular season beyond qualifying for the playoffs. Every fall, those of us who care about the game excitedly begin watching the proceedings as though they matter. And every spring, and in this case summer, we’re reminded again that they essentially don’t; that the relatively genteel brand of hockey played during the typical 82-game schedule amounts to a civilized warm-up to the uncaged and under-officiated stuff of the Stanley Cup tournament. They’re like two distinct sports with two different rule books — or, at least, officials who interpret the same rule book differently depending on the stakes.

And, sure, it’s not just the referees. The playoffs come with a heightened level of desperation and intensity, not to mention undoubtedly different stakes. Some thrive under the glare. Some don’t.

You can argue the whole construction is flawed and in need of repair. In European soccer, for instance, the team that wins the equivalent of the regular-season title generally wins a trophy that’s valued and celebrated. In North American team sports, we’ve somehow decided to toss out the results accumulated over six months and condemn a team for a few ill-timed bad games.

If that doesn’t exactly made sense, it’s reality. Regular-season dominance doesn’t necessarily translate to post-season glory. Colorado became the sixth straight winner of the President’s Trophy to be eliminated in the second round or earlier. The top team in the regular season has won the Stanley Cup once in the last 13 seasons. This year’s trio of Hart Trophy nominees, Colorado’s Nathan MacKinnon, Edmonton’s Connor McDavid and Toronto’s Auston Matthews, won one playoff series combined.

The top regular-season scorer in the Stanley Cup final, Tampa’s Brayden Point, finished tied for 33rd in the race for the Art Ross Trophy. Montreal’s top regular-season scorer, Tyler Toffoli was 48th.

The irrelevance of the regular season has been doubly underlined by Nikita Kucherov, of the Lightning, who is leading the playoff scoring race after missing the entirety of the 56-game campaign recovering from hip surgery (this while also conveniently keeping the capped-out Lightning from needing to shed salaries in their attempt at a title defence). And speaking of irrelevance, at least one owner, Carolina’s Tom Dundon, has publicly pushed for an expanded playoff format, which, if it’s embraced, only stands to make the 82-game exercise even more meaningless.

What are the Leafs to do? Barring a roster blow-up, they’ve got a limited number of choices. They could complain. Or, to put it in a more dignified frame, they could vigorously lobby the league to re-examine post-season refereeing standards that seem as non-existent today as they have since the Shanahan summit — the coming together of big hockey minds, spearheaded by Leafs president Brendan Shanahan, that led to a game-changing crackdown on hooking and holding beginning in 2005-06. Certainly there would be skill-based teams, among them the perennial playoff underperformers in Edmonton, who’d be well-advised to join such a campaign.

What’s the point of building a team based on high-skill, high-priced talent if the apparent post-season moratorium on calling the rules allows defensive-minded grinders and big-bodied blueliners to neutralize stars with unfettered cross checks and assorted uncalled rough stuff? It’s amazing GMs don’t publicly pose that question more often.

Of course, it’s complicated. The NHL has never been known for its progressiveness. Officiating, even with clear directives from a well-run league, is beyond difficult. But if the Leafs aren’t going to attempt to instigate change — well, then they need to change.

Maybe they need more size on the blue line. Certainly they need a plan for their goaltending future, not to mention an army of scouts to unearth that long-sought killer instinct at reasonable prices. And thenthey need a keen eye to decide whether or not a revamped roster is truly built to get over the playoff hump. In making that judgment, the brain trust would be well-served to remember what many of us annually seem to forget — that the games played next fall and winter, for all the attention we’ll pay them, won’t provide an answer to much.