The month of January — forget that the third period against the Pittsburgh Penguins on Tuesday night was a disaster — turned out to be rather successful for the Maple Leafs.
The Leafs were 7-4-1 in January, and it’s a winning percentage they’re going to have to try to replicate in February to keep their charge to a playoff spot alive.
No less than 14 games, starting with the second half of a home-and-home with the Penguins on Wednesday night at the Air Canada Centre, await the Leafs in February.
Toronto crept into eighth place in the Eastern Conference with a point after they lost 5-4 in a shootout to the Penguins on Tuesday. If the Leafs head into March with just a .500 record in the previous month, they’re bound to be on the outside of a playoff spot again.
It’s great that Mikhail Grabovski (there’s no way the Leafs can trade this guy, by the way) and Clarke MacArthur have found their scoring touch. But your best players have to be your best players, and the Leafs have to get more from Phil Kessel and Joffrey Lupul. They’re not getting the same kind of space as they were before, but good players find a way around, or through, that.
The biggest test for the Leafs comes right away after they lost for the first time this season (18-0-1) when leading after 40 minutes.
They’re young and everything, but they’re too deep into the season for that to be an excuse.
Anything less than a fine bounce-back performance against the Penguins on Wednesday would be two steps back.

Mikhail Grabovski’s timing couldn’t have been better.
With Phil Kessel and Joffrey Lupul telling reporters in Ottawa during all-star weekend that their space on the ice is becoming tighter with each passing game, Grabovski was named the NHL’s first star of the week on Monday.
Grabovski was honoured for recording a goal and four assists as the Maple Leafs swept the New York Islanders in a home-and-home set last Monday and Tuesday.
As scoring opportunities dwindle for Kessel and Lupul, the Leafs, who are ninth in the Eastern Conference with 55 points and 33 games remaining, will require production from other areas. Grabovski has demonstrated he can be a player who provides that, and it would be a good thing if he can come close to the pace he set in the last couple of games before the break.
Grabovski is third in Leafs scoring with 32 points (16 goals and 16 assists) in 43 games.
Of course, Grabovski’s name has been bandied about in trade rumours as he is due to be an unrestricted free agent on July 1. General manager Brian Burke wants to add size up the middle, and Grabovski could be part of a package that moves out of Toronto in a trade.
Nashville Predators goalie Pekka Rinne had two wins in two starts and was named the second star. Ottawa Senators Daniel Alfredsson, who basked in the glow that was the all-star festival in his NHL town, was named third star of the week.
The Leafs have a home-and-home series with the Pittsburgh Penguins, on Tuesday in Pittsburgh and on Wednesday in Toronto, as they return from the break.

Few playoff series involving the Leafs — when they were annual participants in the Stanley Cup tournament — have been as vicious as the Eastern Conference quarterfinal with the New York Islanders in 2002.
Darcy Tucker earned the forever wrath of Islanders fans when his low-bridge hit on Michael Peca blew out the Islanders forward’s left knee. A Gary Roberts hit on Kenny Jonsson gave the Isles defenceman a concussion.
There were the antics of the Isles’ Steve Webb, who was an ornery pest during the games in Long Island yet all but disappeared for the games in Toronto.
Shayne Corson was suspended for Game 7, won by the Leafs 4-2 in Toronto, after he tried to kick Eric Cairns during Game 6.
But it wasn’t just on the ice where there was boiling blood.
After the Leafs won the first two games of the series, Isles general manager Mike Milbury gathered reporters at Nassau Coliseum for the sole reason of launching into a tirade against the Leafs and the officials. Ploy or not, it worked, as the heat shifted off Milbury’s players and they won the next two games.
And we’ll never forget what we saw prior to Game 6 in the parking lot outside the arena in Uniondale, N.Y. Just a wide concrete expanse, mostly parking lot, separates the rink from the Long Island Marriott, where reporters routinely stay to cover Leafs trips for games against the Islanders.
Three hours before game time, with some serious tail-gating happening, a couple of Islanders fans pulled a large Canadian flag from their car and burned it to ashes, stomping on what was left.
Though it was a strike against Canada as a whole, it summed up what fans on both sides thought of the opposing teams.
The home team won every game in the series, and the Leafs went on to beat Ottawa before falling to Carolina in the conference final.
It’s not hard to imagine how crazy it would be in Toronto if and when the Leafs make the playoffs again. But it’s difficult to think that anything could get as all-around nasty as that Leafs/Islanders series in April 2002.

Ron Wilson was saying on Sunday that it’s too easy to overemphasize the play of special teams, considering the Leafs have been killing off all the minors that have come their way but have not won much lately.
Still, one has to figure that if the Leafs hadn’t gone cold when they have a man advantage, they would be better off in the standings today.
Toronto has scored just one power-play goal in five games, and that came in a victory against the Minnesota Wild on Thursday. The Leafs had six chances that night.
In their four recent losses, the Leafs were 0-for-11 when an opposing player was serving a minor.
“What we have not been doing is getting the puck to the high point in the middle and getting the shot through,” Wilson said. “We have been stuck on the flanks and not moving our feet. Getting the puck out to Dion (Phaneuf) or whoever is in the middle, that settles things down. We have got away from that.”