What Rivalry? More Canadians Say They'll Cheer for Any Canadian NHL Team in Playoffs: Poll

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Although they cheer for different teams, Canadian NHL fans are a close-knit bunch. And a new Angus Reid Institute poll suggests more Canadian fans are rooting for any Canadian team to win the Stanley Cup than eight years ago.

The new poll, released Monday, showed that 64 percent of 1,138 respondents said they’d cheer for any Canadian team to win the Cup this season – and that’s up seven percentage points from the same poll question in 2016.

There’s much more of a split when it comes to which particular team respondents think has the best chance to win.

The Toronto Maple Leafs led the way with 21 percent, followed by Edmonton (20 percent), Vancouver (14 percent) and Winnipeg (five percent). But clearly, feelings of Canadian nationalism have taken root across the country.

It’s been more than three decades since the last Canadian team won a Cup (the Montreal Canadiens did so in 1993), but the voting in this year’s Angus Reid poll shows there’s a regional breakdown of voters taking place here.

To wit: the Leafs have nearly three-quarters (73 percent) of respondents in Ontario choosing them as the team they want to win a Cup, and more than half of fans polled in Atlantic Canada (52 percent) want the Buds to win it all.

Meanwhile, in British Columbia, 83 percent of respondents are rooting for the Canucks, while in Manitoba, 86 percent said they wanted the Jets to win. And with the Calgary Flames out of the playoff picture, about two-thirds of Albertans are now behind the Oilers to win the Cup. Another 16 percent of Albertans are behind the Canucks, while nine percent are rooting for the Leafs.

Interestingly, when it came to picking the team they thought would be in the best position to win a Cup, the Leafs lost ground to the Oilers, with Toronto dropping from 26 percent in 2021 to 21 percent this year and Edmonton moving from seven percent in 2021 to 20 percent this year. Undoubtedly, the Oilers’ rise through the rankings with superstars Connor McDavid and Leon Draisaitl is responsible for the surge, but Toronto ultimately remains the go-to pick.

Cole Caufield and Mark Scheifele David Kirouac-USA TODAY Sports

Another intriguing element to the poll is that the Montreal Canadiens received nine percent of the vote as the team with the best chance of ending Canada’s Cup drought – four points more than the Jets, who just might be the best all-around threat to win the Cup this season. The reasons for that could be that (a) fewer fans across Canada get to see Winnipeg’s games regularly, and (b) Canadiens fans are diehard supporters through the good and bad times the franchise is going through at any one point in time.

That said, Toronto fans can be found across Canada, and that’s what’s reflected in the poll.

The way the poll played out this year, it’s safe to say many Canadians don’t care exactly who wins the Cup, so long as an American team doesn’t win it. That’s a provincial approach, but tribalism is a real factor in the modern-day NHL, and it thus follows that Canada’s NHL teams are getting more support than ever as they attempt to win the toughest trophy in pro sports.

Canada-or-bust is what we’re looking at now for more and more NHL fans, and when the playoffs begin, don’t be surprised to see Canadians coming out in support of any and every Canadian team that remains in the tournament.

The online survey by the Angus Reid Institute was conducted from April 9 to 11 among a representative randomized sample of 1,615 Canadian adults who are members of the Angus Reid Forum. For comparison purposes, a probability sample of this size would carry a margin of error of plus-minus two percentage points, 19 times out of 20.