The Edmonton Oilers’ fanbase ranks ninth in a new “NHL Positivity Index” study published by students at the University of Alberta.

The study, conducted by the U of A’s Undergraduate Artificial Intelligence Society, used data collected from each NHL team’s Reddit community to gauge which fanbases express the most and least positive sentiments before, during, and after games.

“In particular, we extracted comments from the game day, pre-game, and post-game threads or threads of similar nature in each team’s subreddit,” the study methodology reads. “We did this to try and ensure that we have similar data from every team in the NHL.

“We also felt that posts under the pre-, post-, and game-day threads were the most authentic way to gauge general fan sentiment.”

The Florida Panthers, fresh off a season in which they won the Atlantic Division and ultimately defeated the Oilers to win their first-ever Stanley Cup championship, ranked at No. 1 in the survey with a “Positivity Score” of 6.96.

According to the study methodology, the Positivity Score is calculated with a formula that combines factors including the number of comments in each team’s game threads and the number of upvotes on each comment.

The Winnipeg Jets and Montreal Canadiens fanbases ranked as the two most positive north of the 49th parallel, with the Oilers’ score of 3.04 ranking third among Canadian teams. The Calgary Flames finished close behind the Oilers, with their 2.98 positivity score ranking 11th, while the Toronto Maple Leafs, Ottawa Senators, and Vancouver Canucks all finished in the bottom half.

The Vegas Golden Knights, who failed to repeat as Stanley Cup champions this past season, were measured to have by far the least positive fanbase on Reddit. Their -1.07 score was one of only two in the negatives (the Buffalo Sabres were the other, at -0.22) and represented one of the largest outliers in the study.

The Oilers got off to a very poor start to the 2023-24 season, which could explain their score being lower than teams like Washington, Montreal, and San Jose. They quickly rebounded after hiring Kris Knoblauch as head coach, finishing second in the Pacific Division before making it to the Stanley Cup Final for the first time since 2006.