Back in 2022, Bodog Sportsbook took on one of the most important tasks in our company’s long history: Identifying the five most popular sports teams in Canada. The avalanche of emails we received in response to our Top Five was unlike anything we’ve ever experienced – thanks to all of those ardent fans of the teams who failed to make our list.
Things are about to get even more heated. We’ve revisited our Top Five here at Bodog, taking into account more recent trends in Canadian sports. We’ve also opened the field to include national teams as well as those from “domestic” leagues like the NHL. And after crunching the numbers, we can tell you: Fans in Winnipeg and Montreal are going to be very disappointed.
Dropping the Winnipeg Blue Bombers from our No. 5 spot was a tough call. They’re still the most popular and enduring club in the CFL, leading the league last year with 31,165 fans per game, but the Bombers have lost three straight Grey Cups since our original Top Five came out. The Big Blue bandwagon isn’t quite as full as it used to be.
Then you have the ultimate sacrilege: taking the Montreal Canadiens off of our list. They’re only the most successful franchise ever in all of Canadian sports – the country is even in their name. But TV viewership was down 12% across the board during the 2024-25 NHL campaign. It’s entirely possible the NHL will end up like Canadian football, with big-city teams like Montreal giving way to more passionate (!) regional fanbases out West.
Speaking of which, our new No. 5 team also happens to be the one that almost claimed Canada’s first Stanley Cup since the 1992-93 Habs. Here’s our updated list at Bodog Sportsbook; we eagerly await your response.
5. Edmonton Oilers
They don’t have the same long and storied history as the Canadiens, but none of the 18,347 screaming fans in attendance was thinking about that when they packed Rogers Place to watch the Oilers take on the Florida Panthers in the 2024 Stanley Cup Final – and again in 2025. All they wanted was their first Cup since Mark Messier led them to glory in 1990.
They’ll have to keep waiting for at least one more year. But those deep playoff runs have made Edmonton very fashionable indeed; some 4.39 million viewers tuned into Sportsnet and TVA to watch the 2025 Final. Add another million or so Instagram followers, and you get the most popular Oilers team this side of Wayne Gretzky.
4. Toronto Blue Jays
The Blue Jays may have slipped from No. 2 on our list, but the fundamentals are still there: Canada’s only Major League Baseball team since the Montreal Expos skipped town 20 years ago is pulling in roughly 25,000 fans per game to Rogers Centre, and easily outstrips American teams like the New York Yankees when it comes to the TV numbers up North.
Do the Blue Jays compete with Edmonton’s Stanley Cup run? Maybe not on a per game basis, although 1.26 million viewers a pop on Sportsnet for their recent series with the Chicago Cubs is nothing to sneeze at. Neither are those roughly two million Instagram followers. Let’s see if Toronto can take those numbers to the moon by winning their first World Series since 1993; the Jays are tied for sixth on Bodog’s MLB odds list at +1000 as we go to press.
3. Toronto Raptors
Okay, we may have been a bit quick to anoint the Raptors as our country’s most popular team last time, but that’s partly because the NBA point spread naturally lends itself to sports betting compared to the NHL puck line. It’s also because basketball is a sport on the rise, both nationally and globally. Toronto’s 4.1 million Instagram followers are living proof that the future is bright for Canadian hoops.
Like the Blue Jays, the Raptors have a stranglehold on the Canadian NBA market. Even during this recent rebuild following the break-up of their 2019 championship squad, Toronto regularly brings 18,000+ fans to Scotiabank Arena – and if they can get back on track, they’ll almost certainly top the average audience of 7.7 million who watched Kawhi Leonard and the Raps beat the Golden State Warriors for the title.
2. Men’s National Hockey Team
Team Canada doesn’t play as often as the other clubs on our list, but when they do, it’s must-see TV. The 4 Nations Face-Off final between Canada and the United States drew some 10.7 million Canadian viewers, driven in part by the changing political winds south of the border. That international tournament (Sweden and Finland were also involved) may have single-handedly saved the NHL’s All-Star Game by completely replacing it.
If there’s any controversy over Team Canada’s inclusion on our list, it’s because we can’t quite pin down this team’s reach on social media. We tend to lump in the men’s and women’s clubs as part of the larger national program – and let’s not forget the juniors who compete every year at the IIHF World Championship. But the men’s senior national team will be front and centre next February at the 2026 Winter Olympics in Milan and Cortina d’Ampezzo.
1. Toronto Maple Leafs
Okay, Maple Leafs fans, we heard you loud and clear. No matter how much this team has suffered since their last Cup win in 1967, the Leafs have always played to a full crowd – which is around 18,800 for Scotiabank Arena. And while their TV ratings have topped at around 2.9 million for the Stanley Cup playoffs, that’s pretty impressive given Toronto’s failure to make it beyond the second round. So we’ve moved the Leafs up from No. 3 to their rightful place at the centre of Canada’s sports universe. We also can’t ignore the fact that the Maple Leafs have about twice as many Instagram followers as Edmonton. That’s demographics for you; aside from Team Canada, it’s pretty much a given this country’s most popular teams will come from Canada’s largest city. Will this finally be the year they end our long national nightmare and bring home the Cup? You can bet on it right now. The Leafs are tied at No. 8 on Bodog’s NHL odds list at +1800, with Edmonton second at +800 and the defending two-time champions from Florida at +600.