to go along with this, vancouver really is the (angry) middle sibling. my view is probably slanted, but the amount of hate towards edmonton seems to be disproportionately coming from the west, and in a one-way fashion. what's very weird to me is that calgary - the city that should be fuming right now - feels like a neglected cousin that just accepts they're held in lower regard or something. maybe has something to do with the one-sidedness of that rivalry in recent years. the van-edm tension is obviously exacerbated by the recent coin flip playoff series too
it's hard to place the flames, sens, and jets in the "canada's team" discussion, because i think they just don't register enough for anyone to really care if they make it far enough to start contending for the title. the leafs, oilers, and canucks, at least in recent times, have the most dominant fanbases in this conversation. and the habs are kind of a different thing altogether, quebec talk aside.
it's fascinating haha.