DETROIT -- After playing three games in four nights to open up their season, the Red Wings are in the midst of four days off until Thursday, when they host the Phoenix Coyotes at Joe Louis Arena.
With a 2-1 record, the Wings feel pretty good about their start, but they know they still have a long way to go.
“We feel we’re off to a pretty good start,” Wings coach Mike Babcock said. “We didn’t like the fact that we didn’t stick to believing in our structure and doing what we do in Boston (a 4-1 loss). You have to give them a ton a credit. They played way better than we did.
“These next few days, get people rested and compete and work hard in practice. It’s critical we keep taking steps.”
Babcock plans to go every other day between practice and giving the Wings a day off -- something that the players embrace, although having four days off this early in the season is somewhat weird.
“That’s the way it is," Nik Kronwall said. "I’m sure there’s a reason why.
"We’ve had three games. We know a little bit more what we need to work on, just got to stick to the game plan, keep working, move forward.’’
Daniel Alfredsson believes that four days off will refresh the Wings and allow them to hone in on all aspects of their game.
“It gives us an opportunity to work on things from the first three games, fix some things and be sharp again on Thursday,” he said. “It’s usually like this at the beginning of the year. It starts fairly slow and then, with an Olympic year, it’s going to get pretty hectic once we get going.
"Three games and then a little break, we should be pretty fresh come Thursday.’’
One part of the Red Wings' game that needs to come around is their power play. They're 0 for 8 with the man advantage.
Although they haven’t looked completely atrocious, the Wings need to develop cohesion on their power-play units.
“It can get better," Alfredsson said. "We need to depend on it. We’ve done some good things, but we haven’t put the puck in the net and that’s what it’s all about.
“It’s not big changes we need to make; it’s small adjustments. It’s one of those things where I believe it’s a new look, and all we need is a couple to go in and we’ll feel great.
Eventually, the Wings' power-play units will come around. There’s too much talent for them to be ineffective.
If they should be concerned about anything this early in the season, it has to be their third line of Joakim Andersson, Daniel Cleary, and Todd Bertuzzi, which has failed to register a single point.
“Every year, we get excited about Pav (Pavel Datsyuk) never scoring in this game, and look at the record book at the end of the year and he has 80 points every year," analogized Babcock, who's not ready to panic about the play of his third line yet. "Let things evolve here and it’ll work out. I think they’ve played pretty hard.”
One Wings player who agrees with Babcock’s assessment is Cleary.
“It’s been OK," he said of his line's play. "Obviously, you want to be good at both ends, but it’s three games in. Not that concerned.”
