If you think it’s been a long time since a Canadian team hoisted the Stanley Cup, try being a British tennis fan.

In case you’re counting, the last time the Cup was won by a team north of the 49th parallel was in 1993, when Patrick Roy’s Montreal Canadiens beat Gretzky and the LA Kings in five games. A lot of people consider the Stanley Cup, and even hockey as a game, to be incontrovertibly Canadian, but since the Habs won 19 years ago, every championship series has gone to a US-based team. The Ottawa Senators, Calgary Flames, Edmonton Oilers and the Vancouver Canucks (twice) have appeared in finals since then, but northern fans have gone into the summer empty-handed and broken-hearted each time.

So, wah. The Brits haven’t celebrated a hometown men’s singles hero on Centre Court since the Great Frickin’ Depression. How long ago was that? Players wore PANTS during matches.

Fred Perry won Wimbledon three consecutive times, from 1934 to 1936. In case math isn’t your strong suit, that makes 76 years since the All England Club has honoured a home court victor. Scottish-born Andy Murray appears in this week’s Wimbledon final, making him the first man from the British Isles to contest the pineapple-topped trophy (yeah, I know… I’d have thought ‘lime’, too…) since – wait for it – 1938.

You read right. There have been no Scots, no Welshmen, no Brits, even taking politics out of it, no Irishmen! Not a single male subject of the throne has made a Wimbledon final in 74 years.

To be fair, we should acknowledge the other disciplines. Virginia Wade won the women’s singles draw in 1977, and Jeremy Bates & Jo Durle won the mixed doubles crown in 1987. But the drought on the men’s side is so dramatic, the tennis world is fixated on Murray’s every breath this week. He won’t have it easy, either – he faces none other than Roger Federer, only the most decorated man in the sport’s history who has qualified for the Wimbledon final a record eighth time. Think he’s over the hill, making a Murray win a gimme? Maybe. He only had to go through the defending champ & world number one player, Novak Djokovic, and did so convincingly.

So if you’re wondering why tennis is suddenly getting a lot of media attention, it’s because Andy Murray’s journey to Centre Court this weekend is of major historical import to one of the most famous sporting tournaments in the world. And if you’re not wondering why, then shame on North American media outlets for not doing their jobs. This is big, guvna. Jolly, bloody huge.