Detroit Winged by the Canucks

Henrik Sedin scored an unassisted goal, off the shoulder of Detroit’s Igor Larionov, at 13:59 of overtime to give the Vancouver Canucks a 4-3 win over the Red Wings on Wednesday night in Game 1 of their first-round series at Detroit.

A sold-out crowd left Joe Louis Arena virtually silent as the Red Wings stumbled on the first step toward their quest for the Stanley Cup.

“We’re not going to panic; everybody else can panic,” Detroit’s Darren McCarty said. “It’s what we expect with the team we have, with what we expect of ourselves and what people expect from us. We know what it is.”

The “it” is a Stanley Cup, the only result that will be acceptable for the Red Wings and their fans.

Detroit, which had the NHL’s best record, will play host to the Western Conference’s eighth-seeded Canucks again Friday, in the best-of-seven series.

“It makes Friday even bigger,” McCarty said.

Sedin said he didn’t have a clear path toward Dominik Hasek, who made just 22 saves, so he just lifted his shot into traffic from above the right circle.

“I just tried to get it on net,” Sedin said.

It led to Vancouver’s first playoff win since 1996.

Detroit Coach Scotty Bowman defended the play of Hasek, the six-time Vezina Trophy winner and two-time league MVP.

“One was deflected and one was in traffic,” Bowman said. “There’s not much you can do on those.”

Luc Robitaille, Sergei Fedorov and Igor Larionov scored for the Red Wings in regulation to give them 1-0, 2-1 and 3-2 leads.

Todd Warriner, Andrew Cassels and Trevor Linden scored for Vancouver.

Linden’s goal tied the score, 3-3, at 10:47 of the third period.

Philadelphia 1, Ottawa 0-- Nobody is questioning Roman Cechmanek now.

Cechmanek made 35 saves and Ruslan Fedotenko scored 7:47 into overtime, lifting the Flyers in the opener of their Eastern Conference quarterfinal series at Philadelphia.

“He kept us right there. He played outstanding the whole game,” Flyer Coach Bill Barber said of Cechmanek, who struggled in the playoffs last year.

Cechmanek, a Vezina Trophy finalist last season, allowed 18 goals in a six-game series against Buffalo in his first playoff series. He was 2-3-1 in his last six regular-season starts after returning from an ankle injury that forced him to miss 13 games.

The Flyers, who had won only two of their last 10 regular-season games, were outshot, 32-15, in regulation but took nine of the 12 shots in overtime.

After getting a few solid scoring chances early in overtime, the Flyers capitalized on a freak play. Marty Murray, while falling to the ice, dumped the puck toward the net from the wing. It hit defenseman Shane Hnidy’s skate and ricocheted into the slot to Fedotenko, who backhanded it past goaltender Patrick Lalime’s glove.

Carolina 2, New Jersey 1--The depleted Devils are in an early first-round playoff hole for the first time in four years.

Rod Brind’Amour and rookie Erik Cole scored 1:22 apart and Arturs Irbe stopped 34 shots as the Hurricanes beat the Devils in Game 1 of the Eastern Conference quarterfinals at Raleigh, N.C.

The Devils, two-time defending East champions, were without Joe Nieuwendyk (flu), Petr Sykora (foot), Scott Gomez (broken hand) and Stephane Richer (bruised foot)--and it showed.

New Jersey won last year’s playoff opener, 5-1, against Carolina en route to a 3-0 lead in the best-of-seven series it eventually won, 4-2.

San Jose 2, Phoenix 1--Sean Burke’s only big mistake was enough to doom the Coyotes.

Teemu Selanne passed to Patrick Marleau for the go-ahead goal in the second period after Burke fumbled the puck behind his net, giving the Sharks a victory in Game 1 of their Western Conference quarterfinal series.

Vincent Damphousse also scored for the Sharks, who won the opening game of a playoff series for the first time in seven tries.

Goaltender Evgeni Nabokov stopped 21 shots for his second career playoff victory as the Sharks began their fifth straight trip to the playoffs with a tight-checking win.