PHOENIX - The Blues are 0-2 since returning home from Sweden, and in the wake of the back-to-back losses to Atlanta and LA, the team’s trend of starting slow has been magnified.

Blues coach Andy Murray had a meeting with his players this morning and talked about what they should be focused on tonight against Phoenix. Murray wants the Blues to be assertive and patient, but understand that being assertive doesn’t mean flying around and hitting every Coyote in sight.

“We’ve got to have game patience . . the patience to make the right plays, the right decisions,” Murray said. “Playing hard is one thing, but we haven’t played smart. We need to play smart.”

Murray was asked if it’s tough for a team to try and dictate the play while sitting back and being patient.

“There’s a time to be assertive and a time to be patient,” he said. ”That’s the way we’ve always played. We want to be an aggressive forechecking team. Our theme to always spend the first 20 seconds of a shift in the other team’s zone. That’s what hockey is. Hockey is spending the first 20 seconds of every shift in the other team’s zone. By the time they get the puck to the red line, they’re too tired to play hockey. They’re trying to throw it in and get a change. To do that, you have to get the puck out of the zone quick, get it behind them and make them play in their zone.

“We want to be aggressive all the time. But you can also play wreckless. You send one guy (into the offensive zone), and your second guy is going in, and they move it right by you and then we’re playing in our zone. That’s where you’ve got to be patient.”

********

How about a trivia question today? The answer will be at the end of the blog.

Name the five active players in the NHL who played for the Winnipeg Jets? (Hint: Two of the five will be in the game tonight in Phoenix).

********

The “Kid line” of David Perron, Patrik Berglund and T.J. Oshie will be reunited tonight.

There has been some discussion that those three have trouble playing with Paul Kariya, Keith Tkachuk, etc., because of the pressure placed on them. There could be some truth to that.

In training camp, I asked Berglund about playing on a line with Kariya and the first thing he talked about was “responsibilities” you have playing with a guy like Kariya. The thinking goes that maybe the kids analyze too much and don’t let their instincts take over when they’re playing with the Blues veterans.

I posed that question to Murray today . . .

“I’m sure there’s some pressure playing with Paul or playing with Keith . . . I’m sure there’s some of that,” Murray said. “But you try to do everything for a reason and we thought that could be a pretty good line (Kariya-Berglund-Boyes).”

Murray took his answer a step further and said for the Blues to improve their recent performance, the players have to step up.

“What we’re trying to do now, when you get into a situation when you haven’t played as well as you’d like to play, there’s two ways you can go,” he said. “You can overcoach, or you can put the game in the hands of the players. What we’re doing, I don’t think we’ve overcoached so far this year and we’re not going to start now. This is a lineup that got the job done for us. We’ve tried some different things, and we had good reason to do that. Obviously we played well through the preseason doing it the way we were. I could rationalize every decision we made in our lineup, but in this situation tonight, we’ve basically said, ‘We’ve struggled to get the game we want (but) now we’re giving it to you. We’re not running it . . . we’re putting the game in your hands. You’ve got to make the difference. We’ll coach, we’ll be there to support you’ . . . but you’ve got to put the onus on the players.”

How about this wimpy prediction from Erik Johnson . . .

Johnson told me this morning that he predicts a breakout game for the kids tonight. When I asked him if he wanted to go “on record” with that prediction, he said, “Let’s see if it happens first, and if it does, then you can tell everybody that I said it.”

So I’m going to wait until after the game to tell everybody he said that . . .

********

Here are the lines tonight:

Andy McDonald-David Backes-Brad Boyes

Brad Winchester-Keith Tkachuk-Paul Kariya

David Perron-Patrik Berglund-T.J. Oshie

Alex Steen-Jay McClement-B.J. Crombeen

********

While the Coyotes are 3-2 and have wins over Pittsburgh and San Jose, they have scored only one goal in their last three games.

********

Tyson Strachan has been recalled and will be in the lineup tonight. Here are the defensive pairings:

Erik Johnson-Darryl Sydor

Mike Weaver-Roman Polak

Carlo Colaiacovo-Tyson Strachan

Strachan could see some time at the point on the second power play unit, in place of Perron. Oshie also practiced at the point the past couple of days.

Chris Mason will be in net tonight.

********

Who are the five active players in the NHL who once played for the Winnipeg Jets, now the Phoenix Coyotes.

1. Keith Tkachuk

2. Shane Doan

3. Teemu Selanne

4. Nikolai Khabibulin

5. Kris Draper

If you missed a few, don’t worry about it. Tkachuk needed help with the last couple.

JR