DETROIT – Mike Babcock pushes. He always pushes. He was pushing at practice March 14 in Edmonton, when the Detroit Red Wings were coming off a 5-2 loss in Calgary. Rookie defenseman Brendan Smith had struggled against the Flames, so the coach pulled him aside and told him he would be a healthy scratch the next night against the Oilers.

“OK,” Smith said.

“No, that’s not OK,” Babcock snapped.

Smith collected himself. He told Babcock he agreed that it was not OK, that he just didn’t know what to say because he was “shocked and in awe.” They talked about what he needed to work on, and Smith went to sleep that night frustrated and upset.

At the skate the next morning, Babcock told Smith he would be in the lineup after all.

“I don’t know if it was playing with my mind or whatever it was, but I guess that’s a funny story that I have about Babs,” Smith said. “Maybe he wanted some fire out of me and maybe a higher competition level. I’m not sure what the whole thing was, but he wanted me to play better, and I ultimately did.”

Smith improved markedly that night, and the Wings bounced back with a 3-2 victory, and that’s more than just a funny story about Babs. That’s a window into one of the best coaches in the NHL, if not the best, and one of the best coaching jobs of his career, if not the best.

Babcock took the Mighty Ducks of Anaheim to the Stanley Cup final. He won the Cup with the Wings and came within a game of winning another. He won the Olympic gold medal with Team Canada. But he has faced a different challenge with the Wings this season, thanks to injuries and the erosion of their talent level, most notably the retirement of Nicklas Lidstrom. He used six rookies – not including Swiss import Damien Brunner, who had never played a pro game in North America before – and kept hockey’s Big Red Machine running.

The Wings made the playoffs for the 22nd consecutive season, winning their last four games to get in. They upset the second-seeded Ducks in the first round, coming back from 2-1 and 3-2 series deficits to win in seven games. They entered Monday night tangled in a 1-1 tie with the top-seeded Chicago Blackhawks, responding to a 4-1 loss with a 4-1 win.

“He’s one of the best coaches in the NHL for a reason,” said defenseman Jakub Kindl.

It’s not because he’s warm and fuzzy. It has been an open secret around the Wings that Babcock has clashed with players for years now, from the top to the bottom of the roster. He has clashed with management this season, too, about how certain players are used and the composition of the roster, often issuing public reminders of how much less he has at his disposal. But is that a negative? Or is that a positive? Or does your perception depend on the results?

Scotty Bowman clashed with players. Scotty Bowman clashed with management. Scotty Bowman won more games and more championships than anyone in NHL history. He won three of his nine Cups as a coach with the Wings, and he won one of his 11 Cups total as a senior advisor to the Blackhawks. Though he is on Joel Quenneville’s side in this series, he has been a mentor to Babcock and remains an example for him.

“Scotty Bowman loved the players – absolutely loved them – but he had a job to do,” Babcock said. “Mike Babcock loves the players. When you’re pushing people who don’t want to be pushed, sometimes they don’t like it. I’m here to tell you: When you look at the group of coaches who are still playing right now, they’re pushing their people. That’s just the reality. Whether that’s perceived as positive or negative …”

Pause.

“See, in my world, that’s positive,” he said.

Bowman coached from the 1960s into the 2000s because he evolved with the game and often stayed ahead of it. Babcock has evolved with the game, too, and he has had to evolve with his own team systemically and psychologically.

The Wings outnumber the puck carrier in the defensive zone, like most teams do nowadays. They aren’t quite as skilled as they used to be throughout the lineup, but they use speed and grit to make up for it as best they can. Scouts say they work as hard as ever before.

“In the D zone, I’d never heard of ‘the swarm’ before I got here,” said defenseman Kyle Quincey, who spent 2005-08 in the Wings organization, left for almost four seasons, then returned at the trade deadline last year. “He never talked about that eight years ago. But if you look around on video, all the teams do it now. He’s definitely a very good systems coach. He’s definitely challenged me to a better player, for sure. A lot of skating in this system.”

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