I see this as being year 3 of the rebuild...it began with the firing of Carlyle in Jan '15...all the insiders and experts claimed it would be 4 or 5 years before the Leafs could hope to contend...I guess it depends on what you interpret "contend" to mean.  I don't think the leafs are true contenders quite yet, but they probably are a whole year ahead of schedule - and if they do earn playoff spot, anything can happen because as we've seen, they've beaten just about everyone in the east except the Habs, but I would love to see a playoff series between the two former rivals. The Habs arent that good. And if Price is bad or hurt, they're really not good ...goaltering is important, but more so in Montreal - and Columbus than anywhere else

But the point is that getting Matthews, then Anderson and having the best coach in hockey explains the accelerated rebuild. Is it that surprising? Not to me. Anderson can't go cold though or this is just year 3 of the rebuild.