Fast start, but then ...

DETROIT - For the first eight minutes of the opening period Sunday afternoon, it looked as if the Blackhawks were refreshed from their five days off.

The Hawks had a 1-0 lead on a goal by Adam Burish and were all over the Red Wings. But then Dan Cleary scored at 8:23 after a turnover by Brent Seabrook, and the Hawks suddenly went flat.

Hawks defenseman Brian Campbell said following the 5-2 loss the team was sloppy in practice all week and it carried over into Game 1 of the Western Conference finals.

"Honestly, I think Detroit had the benefit, playing Thursday," Campbell said. "It can favor us maybe longer in the series.

"You have to work hard in practice all week, go after it and make it feel like a game. I don't think some of our practice habits were great, and I don't think we skated as well as we could tonight."

Hawks captain Jonathan Toews tried not to use the layoff as an excuse.

"I'm not going to say that the break was an excuse, but obviously you saw tonight we made mistakes and had mental lapses where we got away from our style of game," Toews said.

Red Wings captain Nicklas Lidstrom admitted his team wasn't very sharp until the Cleary goal.

"I thought they came out with a really good pace, a good tempo in the first five minutes," Lidstrom said. "I thought once we got our legs going we started playing better, controlling the game a little bit more and hanging on to the puck in their zone."

Close call: Adam Burish was thanking his lucky stars he wasn't hurt severely late in the game when the skate of teammate Ben Eager grazed his throat.

All Burish was left with was a scratch and a trickle of blood.

"It was definitely scary," Burish said. "I just said I don't know how my head is still connected here. I saw his skate and it was like he did a figure skating move and I saw it go right to my neck.

"I just put my hand up to protect my throat. I don't know how I'm so darn lucky. It was centimeters, millimeters, away from slicing my throat. It was probably harder for my mom to shake than me. You just try to forget about it, but I'm sure when I see the replay I'll say, 'Oh, my goodness.' "

Burish said Eager didn't know what happened until they talked about it following the game.

Please don't ask: Red Wings defenseman Chris Chelios has a warning for all his friends in Chicago looking for tickets to Games 3 and 4 at the United Center.

"I'm not getting tickets for anybody. You're on your own," Chelios said. "Except for you, mom and dad."

Brett Lebda, the Red Wings defenseman from Buffalo Grove, has adopted the same policy.

"My focus is on the game, so I'm not taking any requests," Lebda told the Detroit Free Press. "It's mom, dad, brother and sister."