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The Detroit Red Wings jumped out to a two-goal lead just five minutes into Game 2, then Anaheim Ducks coach Bruce Boudreau called a timeout to gather his team and deliver a message.

Stay with it.

For the most part, Anaheim had carried the play, but the Ducks were burned by an ugly turnover from Teemu Selanne that set up Damien Brunner’s first NHL playoff goal, one that followed a goal from Justin Abdelkader 48 seconds into the game when he found a corner on Jonas Hiller, screened by a defenseman.

Even when the Red Wings went into the first intermission with that same lead, Boudreau reminded his players that winning each of the next two periods by one goal would be enough to wrestle this game back.

Even as Detroit opened a three-goal lead, Boudreau and the Ducks kept pushing.

“They were always talking about, Get one and we can get two,” Boudreau said. “Get one and we can get two.”

By the time Bobby Ryan tied the game late in the third period, it felt like an inevitability. The push from the Ducks got stronger and stronger as the game went on as Detroit mistakenly tried to sit on a lead against one of the biggest offensive powerhouses in the playoffs.

“They just kept coming at us, coming at us. In the playoffs, you can’t really take your foot off the gas,” Red Wings goalie Jimmy Howard said. “That includes all of us.”

But Detroit hung on in this one, and the 5-4 overtime win taught us something about each one of these teams. First there’s no lead safe against the relentless Ducks. And the young, skilled Red Wings still have enough veteran presence to regroup while learning on the fly in the playoffs.

It sets up the making of what could end up being an incredible series.

Johan Franzen did what he does during the playoffs, scoring twice. But it was 23-year-old Gustav Nuquist who won it in overtime. A mix of Red Wings old and new sending this series back to Detroit tied 1-1.

“We’re going to learn from this experience,” Franzen said. “We’re a young team, a lot of new players this year. We’re probably going to come up stronger from playing this game.”

It was a game that marked the arrival of Detroit’s greenest players. Brunner, who had been slumping offensively, had a three-point night. Nyquist showed his high-end skill, in popping in the game winner. And defenseman Danny DeKeyser continued to show his incredible cool. When Selanne took a swing at the back of his head, then followed it up with a shove, the defenseman who was in college classes a few months ago just skated away.

The win was exactly the formula the Red Wings need moving forward in this series. Contributions from the kids mixed it with the expected production from the veterans, such as Pavel Datsyuk (two assists), Henrik Zetterberg and Franzen.

Boudreau wanted this thing to end in regulation. When the Ducks tied it on Ryan’s goal, he saw Detroit reeling. He saw Howard struggling in goal. He saw an opportunity he knew would disappear with the third period.

It did. The Red Wings regrouped and capitalized on a overtime power play. The goal capped a game in which the competition level, physical play and scoring improved dramatically from Game 1. For both teams.

It only gets more interesting from here.

“We know it’s going to be tight,” Franzen said. “They have a skilled group, a hard playing group like us. It’s going to be fun.”

ST. LOUIS -- Six weeks ago Brian Elliott couldn’t even dress as a backup, let alone give the St. Louis Blues any indication he would soon hold his own -- and then some -- with last year’s Conn Smythe Trophy winner.

Jonathan Quick singled himself out Thursday night after giving up a last-minute goal on a wrist shot to Barret Jackman, a game after his behind-the-net blunder also cost the Los Angeles Kings.

And to be fair, he’s otherwise been outstanding, making yet again a series of saves Thursday night that were highlight-reel material.

But it’s the playoffs, and close doesn’t cut it.

Elliott is the one who is 2-0 in this series, stopping 56 of 58 shots so far and giving the Blues the kind of goaltending he couldn’t a year ago against these same Kings.

“Els stood on his head again tonight and gave us a chance,” teammate Alexander Steen said.

“The first half of the game we really needed him, we had the scoring chances at 13-4 (for the Kings) at one point,” Blues goalie coach Corey Hirsch told ESPN.com. “He made some big saves.”

Hirsch deserves some credit for what is transpiring here in front of our eyes, working with Elliott to bring him back from the wilderness.

It was just a short time ago in late March that Elliott accepted a short conditioning assignment to the AHL to reset himself, having fallen to No. 3 on the Blues’ goalie depth chart.

He’s come back a new man. It’s one of the most unlikely stories of the NHL season.

“When things went bad, he never quit,” Hirsch said. “He kept going on the ice, he kept asking to go out early, he kept just sticking with it. It’s a cliché, but he worked really hard. He’s earned this, he earned it the hard way.”

Technically speaking, Hirsch didn’t want to divulge too many secrets, but it’s clear adjustments were made.

“We’ve changed his game a little bit, we’ve given him a few more tactics to be able to read the play a little better,” said Hirsch. “His post work is a little better.”

Elliott gave Blues fans a scare in the third period when his right leg appeared to buckle after Kings captain Dustin Brown crashed into the net. After staying down on the ice for a while, he eventually stayed in the game. Quick had also given his team a scare in warm-ups when he appeared to labor after taking a shot in the wrong spot. But he, too, gutted it out and said after the game he was fine.

It’s hard to hang an 0-2 series deficit on Quick. Gosh, his first-period save on Jaden Schwartz was just another jaw-dropper on a night when he was superb again -- until the end.

The only thing people will remember from this night was that Jackman beat him 51 seconds from the end of the third period with a wrist shot that simply can’t go in.

“I got to stop that,” a visibly angry Quick said afterward. “That’s my fault. Two games in a row. So, I got to be better.”

Well, so does your team, Jonathan.

The Kings have scored just two goals in this series, one with the extra attacker on the ice late in Game 1, and a 5-on-3 tally in the first period Thursday. That’s not much to hang your hat on as defending Cup champs.

The Kings did play a decent game in the first half, the pushback that we all expected. But it petered out as the Blues came back strong in the third period and scored twice to win it, gaining territorial advantage once again with a physical forecheck.

“We played a really good 40 minutes,” said the captain, Brown. “We got to stay on the body in the third. We didn’t have everyone taking the body. That’s the key to our grind is being physical. We let up in the third on the physicality. And that’s what happens.”

The Cup champs were never down in a series last spring, let alone two games to none.

But as the adage goes, a series isn’t a series until games have been played in both barns.
Don’t count them out, yet.

“We know how tough it is in L.A.,” said the goal-scoring hero, Jackman. “We have to play even better than we did tonight. We know they’ll come out with desperate hockey and Game 3 is going to be physical. They’re going to come out hard and we’re going to have to bring our 'A' game.”

And how about Jackman, he of the zero previous playoff goals in his entire career? The hard-hitting, defensive defenseman jumped into the fray when he saw an opening and ripped one past Quick for the winner as a delirious Scottrade Center rocked.

“It’s nice to contribute," smiled Jackman. "When things are going your way you get a bounce, you get a puck that you don’t normally get, and you put it home. It’s definitely a good feeling.”

But for Blues head coach Ken Hitchcock, it was also about the way his team responded on this night.

The Blues knew they’d get a pushback from the defending Cup champs in Game 2 and they got it, outplayed for most of the opening half of the game.

But then the Blues showed their evolution as a team, their maturity, by settling down and pushing back themselves. That happened when they re-established their forecheck in the second half of the game.

“Regardless of whether we would have won today, I was just happy with the way we played once we calmed down and played better positionally,” Hitchcock said. “We needed to play with more composure, and we did that.”

A year ago, the Kings found their mojo; they discovered how to win after two previous years in the playoffs before that, absorbing playoff lessons.

This year, you just get that feeling the Blues are discovering that path to playoff success.

“I think we learned a lot from previous years and previous experiences,” Steen said. “Right now we have a good vibe, a good attitude in the room."

This series has many more twists and turns, the Kings far from done. But the Blues have already proven one thing: They have gone to the next level in their playoff apprenticeship.

ST. LOUIS -- The architect of last year’s Stanley Cup championship squad watched attentively as his troops went through their drills during an optional practice Wednesday.

The military analogy is appropriate in this case, because Los Angeles Kings GM Dean Lombardi is an avid history buff who adores the comparisons between war and sport and the kind of self-sacrifice, leadership and guts it takes to achieve goals in both.

And so as The General watched practice Wednesday, you could just see the wheels spinning in his mind, his thoughts no doubt knee-deep in the test his team now suddenly faces just one game into the playoffs.

You want a history lesson? His Kings were never once behind in a series last spring, going up 3-0 in all four rounds en route to a well-earned championship.

The script has already changed just one game into the playoffs a year later. And that’s OK, Lombardi said. Standing back and looking at the big picture, it’s not such a bad thing, he figures, for his team to learn how to win in a different fashion.

“We’re going to have to deal with that eventually -- you’re going to have to learn how to win a long series,” Lombardi told ESPN.com outside his team’s dressing room. “Not that you want one, but it’s part of the growth process to learn how to deal with another level of pressure. We really only experienced that once in Game 6 last year [of the Stanley Cup finals]. So here you go. Here it is.”

Not that he’s surprised at what the St. Louis Blues pulled off in Game 1 on Tuesday night, a dominant performance if not on the scoreboard certainly in terms of physical play and puck possession.

Now, normally you’d say that’s a typical reaction from the losing team after dropping Game 1, saying they knew they were in for a tough series. But in this case I can vouch that even before Game 1 was ever played, a conversation with Lombardi during practice Monday revealed his utmost respect for the Blues and the huge test that he believed awaited his team.

And so on Wednesday, in the wake of the Game 1 loss, it is with absolute honesty that the Kings GM talked about the respect his team had for his first-round foe.

“This series last year was probably our toughest,” Lombardi said. “That was not a 4-0 series. Even in the regular season this year, these games are always hard. From top down, both teams are similar, both coaches believe in the same things. I don’t think there’s any question that our players respected this team.

“And so, I don’t know that it’s a wake-up call, per se, but I think it’s a clear reminder what it takes to win in the playoffs. Nobody, to a man, thought this would be easy.”

If there’s a wake-up call here for the players, coach Darryl Sutter said Wednesday, it’s not as much in losing a game but rather in the manner in which they lost.

“What grabs their attention is that they know several of our players can play better,” he said. “We got to overtime with really two lines and four defensemen. You’re not going to win very many games doing that.”

But if you’re looking for any signs of a frantic group after just one loss, even despite never being down in a series last spring, you came to the wrong dressing room.

This was a relaxed looking bunch, Mike Richards informing yours truly on the way out that a group of players was headed to the afternoon Cardinals baseball game to relax.

“The mood’s good,” said star defenseman Drew Doughty. “We’re down 1-0, but it’s all right. If we can get this win and go 1-1 back to L.A., that would be huge for us.”

And of course, that’s very true. A win Thursday night here at Scottrade Center, and the Kings go home confident and in good shape.

But for that to happen, they need to spend a lot less time in their own zone.

There wasn’t a single game last spring when L.A. was bottled up in their own end like it was Tuesday night by a ferocious Blues forecheck.

“We have to be quicker,” Doughty said. “They’re coming hard on their forecheck, they’re banging bodies, they’re creating those little turnovers. I think a lot of times when they created those turnovers we kind of went into panic mode and tried to make up for that mistake quickly.

"I think that’s the wrong thing to do; you have to sit back and find where your guy is and try to create your own turnover. That was the one area they really dominated us in. We didn’t get on our forecheck, which is one of the keys to our game. We need to do that in order to win the next one.”

Wave after wave, all four Blues’ lines hammered the Kings in their own zone. In particular, the fourth line of Chris Porter, Adam Cracknell and Ryan Reaves created pure chaos in the Kings’ zone with a relentless forecheck that left the Kings’ defense dizzy.

“They were coming in hard, and they can make plays, too. I don’t think many of us expected that from them,” Doughty said. “That could have been another downfall of ours. But now we know what they can do. We know they’re going to bend bodies.”

If you’re looking at that comment and thinking you’ve heard that before, it’s because you did -- a year ago. That’s when opposing teams were commenting on how the Kings’ fourth line was creating havoc with their physical play and forecheck, led by unheralded players such as Dwight King and Jordan Nolan.

“It’s the strength of our team, too, being able to play four lines,” Sutter said. “Our fourth line has been interchangeable quite honestly because some of the kids haven’t played very well. Those kids we brought up last year have not played very well this year. So we were hoping for them to play better now and better in a hurry.”

That’s about as blunt as it gets from the Kings' coach.

The Blues beat the Kings playing the same brand of game that won L.A. a championship last year. Now the Kings have to turn the tables Thursday night and find a way to get their forecheck going, impose their physicality on the Blues in the offensive zone.

“We need our guys doing the same thing to their defensemen,” Doughty said rather honestly. “Guys like [Jay] Bouwmeester and [Alex] Pietrangelo aren’t very physical guys. We need to bang their bodies and kind of take them out of the game so they can’t make their plays and rush up the ice.”

And that’s what will make Game 2 so compelling. The defending champs are determined to impose their game. They’ve been awoken. We will find out more about this Blues squad on Thursday night and how they handle that pushback from the Kings.

Buckle up, this series is just starting to get good.