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Boucher is not worried about being outshot, just focusing on the task at hand

Although the Lightning have come out with both wins while in Washington, no one is counting out the Capitals just yet.

The Lightning were outshot by the Capitals 37 to 23 in Game 2 and have been outshot by the opposition 322 to 227 through 9 playoffs. With a day off before the back-to-back set of Game 3 and 4, coach Guy Boucher and Vincent Lecavalier spoke with the media addressing some of those issues as well as the status on Simon Gagne and Pavel Kubina.

Although we are up 2-0 on the series, Boucher was asked if he finds himself in a reversed role from the last series, going from the underdog on the verge of elimination to having the upper hand. “It’s because for me, the roles are not reversed. For me, it’s one game, and every game’s a championship game,” he said dismissing the suggestion. “That’s what we try to do all year long. We never try to look at standings. We never stressed where we were in the big picture. We kept it very limited to what we have to do.”

“I think it’s basically like walking on a tightrope. If you think you’re high and you look down, you’ll start wobbling. If you look up because you think you’re not good enough you start wobbling, too, and you’ll be shaky,” Boucher added. “You just look ahead, and if you focus on the task and what you need to do … you tend to do things the right way.”

And Lecavalier who had the game winning goal on Sunday night agrees saying “We can’t put our guard down. Anything can happen, and we proved that in the first series.”

If you watched Game 2, you know the number of shots that Roloson faced could be quite concerning. But Boucher said that it is not as concerning because “we don’t really look at the shots, we look at the chances for and against, and we’ve been right on par with that since the beginning of the playoffs”.

As for the number of penalties they’ve taken, “If you are intense you are going to get penalties. That’s, you can’t get away with it. But to me, it’s the stick penalties that bother me a lot”. Boucher said those are the lazy penalties or the careless penalties like the hooking, tripping or high-sticking.

The end of the regular season and these playoffs has really seen Lecavalier step up his game offensively in these playoffs but Boucher cautions that “one of the biggest mistakes we make is that, to ask players to get back what they were before”.

To him having his star player buy into the system and play great defensively has its own pros to the team.  “Everybody on the team sees we have a captain who not only buys in (to the system) but is inspiring. I’d rather him score 30 and inspire his team than score 50 and be an offensive guy that is not an example for anybody.”

On the injury front, when asked if either Gagne or Kubina would play on Game 3, Boucher that “yesterday he was more optimistic” and said the chances are “slim” that they would be playing.

Raw Charge writer Matt Amos (also from Don’t Trade Vinny) also contributed to this post

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