Top 3 keys to victory for the Capitals against Lightning

The Washington Capitals host the Tampa Bay Lightning. There's three games left. They have to win each game for any shot at the playoffs and hope the Pittsburgh Penguins drop at least one. That's a tall order.

Anyway here are 3 keys to a Caps victory tonight:

#3 Young bucks step up

The Caps need their young guys to step up. Alex Ovechkin can't do it all by himself. Folks complain about how old the Caps are but they could be a lot older. The team currenlty houses 10 players age 26 or younger.

Of those 10 players, nine being Washington draft picks, have combined to play in 475 games this season which is a 47.5 average and 1,021 career NHL games which is a 102.1 average per the Caps.

The only teams in the league that have 10 plus players age 26 or younger and have more standings points than the Caps are the Boston Bruins, Carolina Hurricanes, Toronto Maple Leafs, and St. Louis Blues.

Overall the only player that wasn't drafted was Rasmus Sandin. That was a big trade aand a big re signing. The player who impressed me the most this season is Hendirx Lapierre, who has become a bolt of energy for the boys in red.

#2 Offense needs to shoot the puck more

The offense needs to put up more shots than they did the last game. Simple match but hard to execute. But they can do it against the Lightning and have shown that this season as they've taken three out of a possible four points against the Bolts in the previous two meetings with tonight being the final matchup of the season between the two teams. The rubber game.

The Caps won the most recent matchup 5-3 on Feb. 22 at Amalie Arena. In the loss to the Buffalo Sabres, John Carlson was a big part of the bad offense but in a good way. He had two assists reaching the 50 point mark for the sixth time in his career, passing Scott Stevens for the most 50 point seasons by a defenseman in franchise history.

Carlson has recorded 50 points with eight goals and 42 assists in 79 games and is just one of two Capitals to appear in every game this season which speaks volumes after he got hurt and missed three months last season.

Carlson, Dylan Strome, Alex Ovechkin and now Tom Wilson has stepped up. Along with Connor McMichael. The rest of the offense needs to as well.