For a coach, having a depth of talent on your roster is sometimes a curse.
Trying to preach attention to detail and defensive awareness to a team that knows, on most nights, they're going to bury the opposition in goals is a tough task.
Your words often fall on deaf ears.
Last season, the Red Wings knew their firepower was unmatched in the league.
Boasting Henrik Zetterberg, Pavel Datsyuk, Marian Hossa, Johan Franzen, Nicklas Lidstrom, and Brian Rafalski; last year's team new they were going to outscore their opponents almost every night, it was just a matter of who and how many.
This year, however, head coach Mike Babcock knew that, for now, those days were over.
With the loss of several offensive weapons over the summer, Babcock told the media and the team that, winning this year was only going to happen if the team committed to playing a defensive game and dedicated themselves to "grinding out" wins.
This was true to be sure, but, Detroit still had three world-class offensive players in Zetterberg, Datsyuk and Franzen and solid secondary forwards such as Valtteri Filppula, Dan Cleary, Todd Bertuz ...
Read Full Article at Bleacher Report - NHL
Article written by Matt Hutter
Detroit Red Wings: Coach Mike Babcock Getting Buy-In from Players
November 14th, 2009 by Matt Hutter Leave a reply »
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