Avalanche players said they felt re-energized during practice Monday after having two days off following a stretch in which they played 13 games in 24 days since the season resumed after the Olympics break.
"It was certainly nice," captain Gabriel Landeskog said. "Everybody was refocused and recharged. Lately we haven't had too many of those breaks, so we did our best to get some rest. It felt like everybody was hungry, everybody had good legs and recharged minds as well. I felt that way and I felt good about coming to practice. It was a pretty hard practice, but it certainly felt good to be out there again."
There won't be much time for rest between now and the start of the playoffs with the final 11 regular-season games being played in 20 days, beginning with Tuesday night's visit to Nashville.
Center John Mitchell didn't make the trip to Nashville and will miss his third game in a row because of his back injury.
"I spoke to him and he said he sees some improvement, but not enough to play," coach Patrick Roy said. "We're not going to put a frame of time, but it's going to be day to day. He could play as soon as (Thursday against Vancouver) or he could miss the next three or four (games)."
Only four of the final 11 games will be played at home. Two of the home games will be played this week, Thursday night against the Canucks and Sunday afternoon against San Jose.
"We have to continue doing what we've been doing, play hard," defenseman Erik Johnson said. "It's good for us to play these tough opponents right before we start the playoffs. We'll get a pretty heavy dose of some really good teams. It's a good test."
The Avalanche has gone 1-3-1 in the past five games and is third in the Central Division, three points behind second-place Chicago with one game in hand. First-place St. Louis is nine points ahead of the Avalanche and leads the West with 103 points.
Roy said he thinks the team "is going in the right direction defensively" in terms of reducing the number of quality scoring chances the Avalanche has been permitting.
"I think it's a good sign," he said. "We had some tough games at home and I thought we did a really good job. I think it's very positive on my side and we need to continue that way."
The Avalanche does have to do a better job killing penalties. Colorado allowed a power-play goal in each of the last three games and at least one in 10 of the past 15 games. The Avalanche penalty killers have fallen to 24th in the NHL with an 80.2 percent success rate. The league average is 82.1 percent.
"Is it a concern? Yes and no," Roy said. "I think overall we're doing a good job. There's small details in our PK. Losing a battle (for the puck) could make a difference. I don't want them to change much. There's a bit of bad luck in some of it. You miss a couple clears and you're not going to start practicing clears, but if you clear the puck ... in Montreal as an example, we missed a couple clears and the puck is in the net."
Semyon Varlamov will start in goal Tuesday. He's tied with Pittsburgh's Marc-Andre Fleury and Tampa Bay's Ben Bishop for second among NHL goalies with 34 wins, and he's sixth with a .925 save percentage. Only Phoenix's Mike Smith has faced more shots (1,817-1,712).
"We would not be where we are without him," Roy said of Varlamov. "Without a doubt he's a very, very serious candidate for the Vezina Trophy."