Capitals right to ice puck late against Golden Knights in Cup Final

The Coaches Room is a regular feature throughout the 2018 Stanley Cup Playoffs by one of four former NHL coaches and assistants who will turn his critical gaze to the game and explain it through the lens of a teacher. Jim Corsi, David Marcoux, Paul MacLean and Joe Mullen will take turns providing insight.
In this edition, MacLean, the former coach of the Ottawa Senators, breaks down the advantages of teams leading by one or two goals late in games continuously icing the puck, a tactic he commends. It's something to watch for in Game 3 of the Stanley Cup Final between the Vegas Golden Knights and Washington Capitals at Capital One Arena on Saturday (8 p.m. ET; NBCSN, CBC, SN, TVAS).

In the waning moments of the Washington Capitals' 3-2 victory against the Vegas Golden Knights in Game 2 of the Stanley Cup Final on Wednesday, the Capitals iced the puck three times in the final minute while nursing a one-goal lead.
RELATED: [Complete Golden Knights vs. Capitals series coverage]
It was the right thing to do. And it's been going on quite a bit in these playoffs.
We saw it in Game 1 of the Western Conference First Round between the Winnipeg Jets and Minnesota Wild. Winnipeg was up 3-2 and iced the puck six times in the final 2 1/2 minutes.
One of the big reasons they survived was center Adam Lowry, who won a number of key face-offs down the stretch and finished the game with a 69 percent winning percentage in the circle.
I would do the exact same thing for the following two reasons:
First off, as a coach, I think it shows that you have confidence in your center icemen. You believe that they will execute in clearing the zone and you have tremendous confidence that you'll win the draw, putting the odds in your favor.

The second thing is, even though the face-off is back in your end and you can't change, at least you break up the momentum of the flow of play.
Consider the alternative.
If you don't ice the puck and you just put it out in the neutral zone and they come back in at you, then the frenzy keeps growing.
I liken it to a fire. It's like you are putting gasoline on the fire and it's starting to burn hotter. It's getting hotter and hotter.
At least if you ice the puck, you stop the fire from getting any bigger. You get a little bit of a pause. You get a chance to breathe. OK now, here we go, we drop the puck again.
What it does is that it breaks up the flow of play. Maybe you don't completely follow the fire analogy, but what it does do is breaks up the momentum, as I mentioned earlier.
Remember this too: If it's late in the game and you have the lead, you probably have two centers out there. In the last two or three minutes, the play is to take one of your wings off and replace him with that second center.
It's a no-brain tactic to ensure you are covered if the first center gets tossed. Of course, they've kind of taken that away with the way they do face-offs now and the warnings they give guys who are either trying to get an advantage in the circle or trying to purposely get the offensive center tossed along with you.
Put all these factors together and you can see why teams are not shy to ice the puck when they have the lead.
Why wouldn't you do it? Take a shot at the empty net. Shoot it in the net and the game's over.

Seems like simple logic to me. That's why I would always encourage the guys to take a shot at the net. And if we have to win the face-off to do it, get in the lane.
But it's more than just that. Late in games it's important to have not only a guy that can win the face-off but have a plan that everybody knows.
Who's going where when the puck is dropped? Who's getting the puck? Who's not getting the puck? Those things are practiced over and over again and rightly so. Because those are the types of things that can be the difference between winning and losing a series.
It's definitely evolved over the years.
When I played, guys like Wayne Gretzky and Dale Hawerchuk were top centers who took most of the draws, including in the defensive zone. You might send out two centers once in a while for key face-offs in case the first guy was thrown, a popular option in the 1980s and '90s.
Now, you have specialty guys who make a living just by winning face-offs. If you can do that job in the defensive zone, you'll have a job in the League for four or five years, in some cases four or five additional years. You don't even have to score goals. All you need to do is win face-offs at crucial times and kill some penalties.
And ice the puck when you need to without worrying about the repercussions.
And hit the empty net.
Hey, when it comes to those tactics, I'm all in.