☀️ Good morning and welcome back to The Nosebleeds.

🕰️ In 1993, the Montreal Canadiens won the Stanley Cup. No Canadian team has got the job done since.

🏜️ But a handful of Canadian teams look awfully good this season. Could this be the year the drought is finally broken?

🍁 It’s time

Many have come close—Calgary in ‘04, Edmonton in ‘06, Vancouver in ‘11 to name a few—but no Canadian team has been able to win the Stanley Cup in 31 years.

But as we near the halfway point of the 2024 season, there are four Canadian teams with a legitimate chance to break the drought and win the Stanley Cup—the Edmonton Oilers, Toronto Maple Leafs, Vancouver Canucks, and the Winnipeg Jets. Let’s take a quick look at why each team could be putting rings on their fingers this spring.

Note: numbers do not include the results of the Thursday’s games.

Edmonton Oilers

• Record [points]: 21-15-1 [43]

• Points % [rank]: .581 [13]

• xG% [rank]: 57.84% [1]

Why they can win: Edmonton has been dominant since Kris Knoblauch replaced Jay Woodcroft as head coach. In Knoblauch’s tenure, the Oilers have two separate win streaks of eight games, and look like the juggernaut everyone expected them to be at the start of the season. Edmonton isn’t just a paper monster either—according to MoneyPuck, the Oilers boast the best 5v5 xG% in the league. This team has found their mojo, and with the best hockey player in the world driving the bus for them, the sky is the limit for Connor McDavid and the Edmonton Oilers.

Why they can’t win: Goaltending. The reason the Oilers were behind the eight-ball to start the season in the first place was because of their goaltending. Can Stuart Skinner really be trusted to outduel the likes of Thatcher Demko, Adin Hill, and Connor Hellebuyck? Only time will tell.

Toronto Maple Leafs

• Record [points]: 21-10-7 [49]

• Points % [rank]: .645 [8]

• xG% [rank]: 50.51% [15]

Why they can win: Toronto has had a solid team for years now, but still haven’t been able to truly breakthrough and make a run. While they have some question marks, if their big boys can actually get hot when it matters, there is no reason the Leafs can’t win the whole damn thing.

Why they can’t win: Because they’re the Toronto Maple Leafs. Hehehe.

Vancouver Canucks

• Record [points]: 27-11-3 [57]

• Points % [rank]: .695 [3]

• xG% [rank]: 50.08% [17]

Why they can win: Sometimes you can’t deny a Cinderella story. I don’t think anyone expected this from the Canucks. Have they gotten a little lucky this season? For sure—they lead the league in PDO (shooting % + save %), and everyone has been waiting for their regression. But it hasn’t happened yet, and who’s to say this simply isn’t Vancouver’s year?

Why they can’t win: Their luck regresses lol.

Winnipeg Jets

• Record [points]: 27-9-4 [58]

• Points % [rank]: .725 [1]

• xG% [rank]: 52.14% [10]

Why they can win: The Winnipeg Jets are the best defensive team in hockey AND have the best goalie on the planet. Connor Hellebuyck leads the league with 18.6 GSAx, and the Jets as a team are allowing 1.63 GAA per 60 minutes at 5v5. How impressive is this number? Well, the second best team in this stat this season is the Florida Panthers at 2.01 GAA/60. If the Jets can keep this up in the second half, they will be the second team in the last decade to accomplish a GAA/60 below 1.70. The other? The 2013-14 Stanley Cup Championship Los Angeles Kings…

Why they can’t win: Special teams. Winnipeg’s PP (18%) and PK (75.9%) have been abysmal this season—their only losses over the last two months are because of their poor special teams play. If the Jet’s can get their special teams to league average, they can easily be the ones lifting the Stanley Cup over their heads. If not? It could come back to bite them come playoff time.

📊 What the numbers tell us

Now that we’ve established that these four Canadian teams have a legitimate Stanley Cup shot, let’s try and actually quantify their chances of ending Canada’s Stanley Cup drought.

On Wednesday, Dom L of The Athletic released his latest projected NHL standings and playoff chances, which we’ve provided below:

No need to overcomplicate how we try and figure out Canada’s Cup chances—let’s simply add up the Stanley Cup probabilities for the four best Canadian NHL teams.

• Winnipeg Jets: 12%

• Edmonton Oilers: 11%

• Toronto Maple Leafs: 6%

• Vancouver Canucks: 4%

Add those up and there is a 33% chance that a Canadian team wins the Stanley Cup in 2024. Pretty good.

Let’s also take a look at MoneyPuck’s Stanley Cup probabilities for comparison.

• Vancouver Canucks: 13%

• Winnipeg Jets: 6.8%

• Edmonton Oilers: 6%

• Toronto Maple Leafs: 5.6%

31.4%.

No matter what model you look at, it seem like there is a 1/3 chance that Canada’s Stanley Cup drought will be coming to an end this season. I can’t remember the last time the odds would have been this high at the midway point of the season.

Exciting time for many Canadian hockey fans.

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