The Washington Capitals are in Las Vegas looking to finish the job up 3-1 in the Stanley Cup Finals. On Wednesday afternoon, the eve of Game 5, the Capitals held a practice at T-Mobile Arena and Lars Eller once again handled the hot lap duties.
Hot lap @lellerofficial #ALLCAPS pic.twitter.com/JfajY4O0CB
— Washington Capitals (@Capitals) June 6, 2018
Lars Eller, of course, handled ‘hot lap’ duties. #ALLCAPS #StanleyCup pic.twitter.com/sek0jaD7td
— Tarik El-Bashir⌨️🎙🏒 (@TarikNBCS) June 6, 2018
By now you guys know the tradition. The Capitals do this prior to road morning skates as a rally. The Capitals haven’t done morning skates in Vegas due to the 5 p.m. local time puck drop on game day so the tradition was moved to practices the day before the games.
Jay Beagle started it in Columbus, Alex Ovechkin continued in Pittsburgh, while coach Barry Trotz handled the hot lap responsibilities in Tampa for Game 7 and before Game 1 of the Stanley Cup Finals. Eller did the hot lap the day before Game 2.
Vegas tried to steal the tradition before Game 3’s morning skate at Capital One Arena with Golden Knights center Jonathan Marchessault doing the honors but didn’t do one prior to Game 4 after they lost.
By Michael Marzzacco
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