To touch or not to touch?

Tomorrow the Stanley Cup finals begin between the Chicago Blackhawks and Philadelphia Flyers.

To get there, each of these teams had to win their conference by beating 3 other teams. The Blackhawks won the Western Conference and the Flyers, the Eastern Conference.

Each conference hands out its own trophy to the winner.

The Western Conference has the Clarence S. Campbell Bowl:

And the Eastern Conference has the Prince of Wales trophy:

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There's some debate among players and fans as to how to celebrate a conference championship. Some believe that it's bad luck to touch these trophies. The real prize is supposed to be the Stanley Cup, and the superstitious think celebrating prematurely could jinx their team's performance. Others feel that winning the conference is a huge accomplishment in itself and should be celebrated as such, trophy and all.

This year, Blackhawks captain Jonathan Toews refused to touch the Bowl, explaining "You know, big deal, it's not what we're after. We're here to win the Stanley Cup.... We're not satisfied yet." What else would we expect from Captain Serious?

In the East, Flyers captain Mike Richards had the opposite reaction:

"It was actually a little bit of a debate on the ice.... My first instinct was to grab it.... We haven't done anything conventional all year, especially in these playoffs. So might as well go against the grain one more time."

We'll have to wait and see who had the better strategy. For the record, last year the Pittsburgh Penguins celebrated with the Prince of Wales trophy, and they won the Stanley Cup. Their competition, the Detroit Red Wings? They had refused to touch their trophy.

Trevor Linden, celebrating after the Vancouver Canucks were crowned Western champs in 1994. Not only did he pick it up, but he dropped the lid (see, it's already fallen off in this picture). The Canucks lost in 7 games in the Stanley Cup final.