"Don't look at newspaper articles. Don't look at the Internet.

That, Marty St. Louis said, will serve the Lightning best as it starts what it hopes to be a playoff push.

"It's hard, but you have to train your brain to just worry about the one game," the wing said. "If you're constantly looking online or at the paper you'll get outside information you don't need."

Such as this: Tampa Bay, with 46 points, is 12th in the East and nine points behind the Devils for the conference's eighth and final playoff spot.

Or this: The Lightning is fourth in the Southeast Division, nine behind the first-place Capitals.

In other words, defenseman Victor Hedman said, "We have a big mountain to climb to get into a playoff spot.""