I remember there was a study of cup winning teams as a function of the amount of Canadian players a team has in combination with their relative significance (are they in the top 4 d? Are they in the top 6 forwards?)

Might be oversimplifying...but there's no doubt that the Stanley cup means something different to Canadians and every year there's a Tom Wilson type that suddenly goes beast because he grew up dreaming about the playoffs.

Past few cup winners

Pittsburgh 2009:
http://www.hockey-reference.com/teams/PIT/2009.html

Chicago roster 2010:
http://www.hockey-reference.com/teams/CHI/2010.html

Boston 2011:
http://www.hockey-reference.com/teams/BOS/2011.html

LA Kings 2012
http://www.hockey-reference.com/teams/LAK/2012.html

That's alot of Canadian flags on those rosters.

Just look at Anaheim's cup winning team in 2007:
http://www.hockey-reference.com/teams/ANA/2007.html


The ONLY team that wasn't heavily Canadian is the Red wings of 2008. And even then...they had more than the Caps did this year or years before.

Caps 2017:
http://www.hockey-reference.com/teams/WSH/2017.html

The Canadian players they do have are mostly at the bottom of their roster. I don't have the effort to confirm this....but skimming through cup winner rosters...They'd probably be the 'least' Canadian team to EVER win the cup if they won this year. That's a pretty big statement.