The "hat" in hat trick

Finally my teams have won. Pitt hoops won against Seton Hall and Georgetown, Rhode Island beat Duquesne, and the Penguins beat the Rangers. It was quite exciting last night when Evengi Malkin put his third goal in during the last minute of play sealing his second career hat trick. As I watched him celebrate, the fans celebrated too by throwing their hats to the ice, a hockey tradition. This, of course, requires that the ice staff (facility workers) clean up. I found it quite amusing that the referees grabbed a stick to help "shoot" the hats into a pile, expediting the clean up process. However it got better. As these poor guys rushed out, the fans began tossing their hats at the ice workers hitting one guy several times. Since it is not a beer bottle, or as I have witnessed, nachos, I found this Hilarious.

This honorable tradition lead me to this question. What do they do with these hats? Listed below are several suggestions.

• Sell the hats in the gift shop - You make more money and just remember, there is a sucker born every minute
• Donate them to Goodwill - mmm.... the tax deduction... mmm
• Allow the "ice workers" to seek their revenge on the fans by swinging their giant bags of hats at the fans while they leave
• Give them all to the player who scored the hat trick
• Ship it, without postage or a return address label so that it goes into the mythical US Postal service holding cell
• Ship them to the other team's goaltender with the following note:

"Dear Goaltender,

Thank you so much for allowing me to disgrace last evening. It was so much fun watching my team's fans cheer so jubulantly. They went home so happy. Do you remember the goal that went through the 5-hole, a beauty wasn't it? We will see that on highlight reels forever! With all sincerity it was so much fun to disgrace you and your team and the bonus money will allow me to kick a few back at the bar. Next time you head into town we'll go out for a few before the game and maybe I'll have a repeat performance"

Sincerely,

Hockey Player

• Give them away as a promotional giveaway
• Throw them away

Please let me know if you have an answer for this age old question.