Red Wings 2, Sharks 0

SAN JOSE, Calif. (AP) _ From Chris Chelios to Dominik Hasek, the Detroit Red Wings all felt they won their second-round series five days before the clinching victory Monday night. <br/><br/>That's

Tuesday, May 8th 2007, 7:50 am

By: News On 6

SAN JOSE, Calif. (AP) _ From Chris Chelios to Dominik Hasek, the Detroit Red Wings all felt they won their second-round series five days before the clinching victory Monday night.

That's when the Red Wings rallied from a 2-1 series hole to the San Jose Sharks and a one-goal deficit in the final minute, tying Game 4 with 33 seconds left before winning in overtime.

The rest of the series was a mere formality to the resurgent Red Wings _ including the 2-0 victory in Game 6 on Monday night that sent the longtime playoff underachievers on to the Western Conference finals in style.

Mikael Samuelsson scored two first-period goals, Dominik Hasek posted his 13th career playoff shutout and the Red Wings rolled off three straight victories against the deflated Sharks, who never recovered from their last-minute flop at the Shark Tank in Game 4.

``It changed the momentum when we won (Game 4),'' said Hasek, who made 28 saves in his first shutout of the spring. ``After that, we're a better team. Overall, the difference was us coming from behind in three of the games. We never gave up. We were able to come from behind when we needed to.''

The top-seeded Red Wings are headed to the conference finals for the first time since winning the Stanley Cup in 2002, opening the next round Friday at home against the Anaheim Ducks. Detroit hung on with a patchwork defense relying heavily on Chelios and Nicklas Lidstrom, who spent nearly all of Game 6 alternating turns on the ice.

``Looking back, Game 4 should have been theirs,'' said Chelios, who had assists on both of Detroit's goals. ``Really. We got so lucky. It was just a turnover and a good break, whatever you want to call it. That was definitely the one that got us here tonight.''

Detroit had won just one playoff series in the previous three seasons despite winning at least 48 games in each, earning two Presidents' Trophies as the NHL's best regular-season team. But the Red Wings, who finished second overall this season, finally parlayed their veteran experience into playoff success against a young opponent that took another postseason of lumps.

Coach Mike Babcock recounted the list of disrespectful perceptions that fueled Detroit's rise this spring.

``You don't get picked to be very good, and then you're pretty good through the regular season, and then someone says you're not a playoff team,'' Babcock said. ``We played two big, strong teams and have done well. And now we're going to get another one.''

Evgeni Nabokov stopped 20 shots for the Sharks, but the best regular season in franchise history ended in another mystifying collapse after San Jose controlled most of the series' first three games.

Joe Thornton and captain Patrick Marleau failed to spark any life from their club after blowing that fateful lead in Game 4.

``We're going to look back at this series, and we're going to kick ourselves probably until training camp next season,'' said Thornton, held scoreless in the last two games after scoring 11 points in the Sharks' first nine postseason contests.

Such momentum shifts are no surprise to San Jose's fans, who have watched their club blow the 2004 Western Conference finals against Calgary and last season's second-round series against Edmonton in similar fashion.

The Sharks blew a lead in each of their first three losses to Detroit, but the Red Wings made certain of the clincher early _ and a litany of mistakes and missed chances kept San Jose from coming back.

``Our start was unbelievable,'' Sharks coach Ron Wilson said. ``We were physical. We had them hemmed in. We made two mistakes, and they scored two goals, and that was pretty much it. They sat back, and Hasek didn't make a mistake.''

The Red Wings scored first on a breakaway set up by a beautiful lead pass by Johan Franzen. He positioned the puck perfectly for Samuelsson, who rolled past stumbling defenseman Matt Carle and dangled until Nabokov went down for an easy score.

A few moments later during a Detroit power play, Hasek misplayed a puck straight to Mike Grier in an error reminiscent of Nabokov's turnover to Pavel Datsyuk in Game 5. But Grier circled the empty Red Wings net and then completely missed it, with his off-target shot hitting a diving Lidstrom.

Samuelsson got his second goal 8 seconds before the first-period buzzer, thanks to another defensive blunder. Samuelsson kept the puck on a 2-on-1 break and beat Nabokov cleanly on the glove side.

Notes: Detroit D Brett Lebda returned to the Red Wings' lineup after a six-game absence with an ankle injury _ just in time to replace Mathieu Schneider, who's out for the postseason with a broken left wrist. ... Grier's clunker echoed Teemu Selanne's famed mistake in Game 7 of the Sharks' 2002 second-round series with Colorado, when he missed an open net in a 1-0 loss.