Canadiens, Leafs remain crowd favourites

It’s been nearly 20 years since a Canadian NHL team hoisted the Stanley Cup, but hockey fans keep rooting for the underdog.

Despite dismal seasons that left them out of playoff contention, the Montreal Canadiens and the Toronto Maple Leafs remain crowd favourites, according to an Angus Reid poll released Friday.

The Canadiens won just 31 games this season, finishing last in the Eastern Conference with an abysmal 78 points. Yet, 19 per cent of respondents — and nearly a quarter of self-described hockey fans — cited Montreal as their favourite Canadian NHL team.

Toronto hasn’t made the playoffs since before the NHL lockout in 2004-05, but 17 per cent of all respondents — and just over 20 per cent of hockey fans — said they still root for the Leafs above all others.

Being a fan of a losing team is like being an athlete who wants to improve their performance, said Leisha Strachan, an assistant professor at the University of Manitoba’s faculty of kinesiology and recreation management.

“I think that the element of hope is big and I think that’s what keeps a lot of athletes going … that hope that ‘I can improve,’ ” Strachan said.

The connection between a fan and their team can come from a variety of sources, Strachan said, from admiration of a certain player to family ties.

Fans often maintain that connection and stick with a losing team because of tradition, according to Dr. Richard Lustberg, a psychologist who blogs on PsychologyofSports.com.

“There’s a cult-like following to it,” Lustberg said.

“It’s passed from generation to generation.”

There are hockey fans who jump on the bandwagon of whoever’s up in the standings, however.

Just 11 per cent of respondents in the Angus Reid poll called Vancouver their favourite team, but more than a third said they would cheer for the Canucks this playoff season.

The Canucks and the Ottawa Senators are the only two Canadian teams in this year’s race for the Cup.

Angus Reid teamed with Maclean’s magazine for the online poll in part to find out whether or not the Canucks were Canada’s most-hated team. They’re not. That honour belongs to the Toronto Maple Leafs; one in five respondents listed the Leafs as their mosthated team.

Among self-described hockey fans, the loathing jumped to 33 per cent.

The poll also looked at how Canadians feel about the cities NHL teams play in, asking respondents to select which municipalities had certain positive or negative qualities.

While Vancouver was ranked the most admired, exciting and fresh city, Toronto received less love, receiving top marks for being the most arrogant, overrated and dirty.

“You do see that the Toronto Maple Leafs are the least-liked team in Canada and that, Toronto itself, it does have some very strong, positive associations, but it does have a bit of a negative connotation for some Canadians outside of Toronto,” Jaideep Mukerji of Angus Reid said of the results.

The online poll, conducted between April 5 and 7, surveyed 1,506 randomly selected Canadians.

The poll has a margin of error of plus or minus 2.5 per cent, 19 times out of 20.