Hockey fans are divided on which team will end Canada's Stanley Cup drought

The National Hockey League (NHL) regular season is just a few days away, and four Canadian teams have earned their spot in the playoffs.

The Toronto Maple Leafs, Winnipeg Jets, Edmonton Oilers and Vancouver Canucks each have a chance to not only win the Stanley Cup, but also end the nation's three-decade NHL championship drought.

However, Canadian hockey fans seem to be divided on which team has the best chance to bring home the Cup.

A new poll of 1,615 Canadian adults by the Angus Reid Institute found that one in five respondents believe Toronto (21 per cent) or Edmonton (20 per cent) will win the prize. Fourteen per cent of those polled think Vancouver will end the drought, while five per cent think Winnipeg will end it.

When asked which team they wanted to see win the Cup, 42 percent voted for the Leafs, a poll largely influenced by Ontario's large population, with 23 percent voting for Vancouver, 22 percent for Edmonton and 13 percent for Winnipeg.

The last time a Canadian team won hockey's biggest prize was in 1993 when the Montreal Canadiens lifted the trophy. Since then, five of Canada's seven hockey clubs have come close, but not all have reached the top.

It's no wonder there's a growing percentage of hockey fans in this country who don't care which Canadian team wins the Cup.

“For many Canadians, the fact that the team won was more important than winning,” the institute said in a press release issued Monday. “In 2016, 57 per cent of Canadians said it didn't matter which team ended the drought…Nearly two-thirds (64%) now say they support any team that calls Canada home.”

Toronto enters the playoffs at 46-24-10 behind Auston Matthews' league-leading 69 goals. Edmonton is 48-25-6, led by former Leaf Zach Hyman's 53 goals.

The schedule for this year's Stanley Cup playoffs has not yet been announced.

Methodology

The online survey was conducted between April 9-11 among 1,615 Canadian adults who were randomized. The institute says a probability sample of that size has a margin of error of +/- 2 percentage points, 19 times out of 20.