BOSTON -- The off day couldn't come at better time for the reeling Red Sox, down three games to one to the red-hot Tampa Bay Rays following Tuesday night's 13-4 pounding.

"Their hitters are hot," Boston centerfielder Coco Crisp said. "We've got to quiet them down somehow."

Perhaps the fact that Game 5 won't be played until Thursday night will help.

"Hopefully, their bats will get a little bit colder," Sox second baseman Dustin Pedroia said in a subdued Boston clubhouse.

The Rays picked up Tuesday where they left off in Monday's 9-1 rout of the Red Sox, as Carlos Pena and Evan Longoria hit back-to-back homers in the first inning off knuckleballing veteran Tim Wakefield. Then, in the third, designated hitter Willy Aybar hit another -- a two-run shot, like Pena's.

"The ball Pena hit wasn't a good knuckleball," Boston catcher Kevin Cash said. "The ball Longoria hit was a pretty good one, but it was just up in the zone. The way these guys are hitting the ball, anything left up in the zone is trouble."

The Red Sox are in trouble, just one loss away from missing out on the chance to repeat as World Series champions.

But they also were a game away from elimination last year in the ALCS, against Cleveland, and battled back to win that series, then went on to sweep Colorado in the World Series.

As Paul Byrd, who came to Boston from the Indians in mid-August, well remembers. The winning pitcher for Cleveland in Game 4 of the ALCS last season, Byrd recalled what turned that series in Boston's favor.

"[Josh] Beckett threw a great game," he said. "That's what [the Sox] needed to happen. That changed the momentum. He shut our offense down, and then we had to come back here.

"We didn't want to go back to Fenway, although I still liked our chances. We told ourselves that all we had to do was win one of two games. But we couldn't do it."

The fact that the Red Sox did it last year is reason to hope they can do it again.

"It gives us confidence," Byrd said. "It has been done before. It gets done by winning one game at a time. We just need to worry about the next game. Something has to happen where somebody steps up and turns the tables."