Whatever it was, the Chicago Blackhawks finally found that extra gear they talked about for days.

Johnny Oduya and Marcus Kruger scored in the third period, Corey Crawford made 20 saves and the Blackhawks beat the Detroit Red Wings 4-1 in the opener of their second-round playoff series Wednesday night.

“Much better from our prior series,” coach Joel Quenneville said. “I thought what we’re talking about in our team game was in place. Had some pace, had some speed, zone time, and I thought everybody contributed.”

In the wake of Chicago’s five-game victory over Minnesota in the first round, Quenneville talked about a higher level of intensity, and each of his biggest stars echoed his comments. The response was a dominant final two periods in the Blackhawks’ first game in the Western Conference semifinals since they won the Stanley Cup in 2010.

Marian Hossa had the opening goal in the first, and Patrick Sharp finished with an empty-netter and two assists to give him nine points in the postseason.

“I thought it was our best game of the playoffs, no question,” Sharp said.

Jimmy Howard had 38 stops in a terrific performance, but Detroit still lost to rival Chicago for the eighth straight time dating to last season.

“I think in the first it was pretty even, but then I think in the second and third they looked like they had a little more energy than we did,” Red Wings captain Henrik Zetterberg said. “It’s going to be nice to have a day off tomorrow and practice and then looking forward to Game 2.”

The series resumes on Saturday at the United Center.

The 75th all-time playoff game between the Blackhawks and Red Wings was tied at 1 after two periods, and Howard made a great stop on a breakaway by Dave Bolland 4 1/2 minutes into the third.

Chicago kept working and went in front to stay on a heady play by Oduya. He drifted in from the point and sent Sharp’s pass past Howard on the glove side with 12 minutes left.

“Getting the win is the only thing that actually matters,” Oduya said. “Like I said, anyone could have scored that goal at that point. We had a lot of chances, and I’m lucky I got it in there.”

Kruger then jumped on a loose puck and sent a backhander into the upper right corner to make it 3-1. That was more than enough for Crawford, who caught a break when Damien Brunner’s rebound attempt went off the crossbar and straight down before Brent Seabrook swept it away with about three minutes left.

The opener of the 16th playoff series between the Original Six teams was the first game for Chicago since it eliminated Minnesota last Thursday. Detroit closed out Anaheim with a 3-2 win in Game 7 on Sunday night, taking the final two games of the series against the second-seeded Ducks.

Despite the long break, there was no sign of rust for the Blackhawks. The Red Wings skated right with Chicago at the start, but they couldn’t keep up at the end of the game and coach Mike Babcock said they were looking forward to a day off.

“We’re not trying to take anything away from them,” he said. “They were better than us. The score tonight was more than fair as far as I’m concerned. They were better.”

The Blackhawks struck first in the first playoff game between the teams since Detroit won the 2009 Western Conference final. With Gustav Nyquist in the box for hooking, Sharp forced a turnover along the boards and Jonathan Toews sent the puck to Hossa, who one-timed it past Howard at 9:03.

Detroit needed less than two minutes to respond, tying it when Brunner poked in a rebound for his third career playoff goal. The rookie center also contributed three assists in the first round against the Ducks.

The Blackhawks killed off two power plays created by penalties on Andrew Shaw. They killed off another one when Nick Leddy was sent off for delay of game in the second period, making them a perfect 20 for 20 on the penalty kill in the postseason and sinking Detroit to 1 for 18 on power plays against Chicago, including the regular season.

“We know that we’re a much better team than this,” Red Wings defenseman Niklas Kronwall said. “The second and third period were not nearly good enough. We know we’re better than this, so we have to find to get better here for Game 2.”

Game notes

It was the 800th game between the teams. … Detroit F Justin Abdelkader was shaken up after he collided with Blackhawks D Michal Rozsival in the first period. He was helped to the bench after a few moments down on the ice, but eventually returned to the game. … Blackhawks F Viktor Stalberg was a healthy scratch. Quenneville said it was a “coach’s decision” and Stalberg could get back on the ice at any point. … Toews and Pavel Datsyuk of the Red Wings joined Patrice Bergeron of the Boston Bruins as finalists for the Frank J. Selke Trophy as the NHL’s best defensive forward. … Chicago won eight of the previous 15 playoff series against Detroit.

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Jonathan Toews and Marian Hossa each scored twice in leading the Blackhawks to an 8-1 rout of the Dallas Stars on Saturday night.

Nick Leddy and Patrick Kane each had a goal and two assists as eight Blackhawks scored two or more points and Chicago boosted its road record to 12-1-2 with a dominant win on the second stop of a four-game road trip.

“A great effort all-around by the team,” said Kane, whose 15th goal of the season was a highlight-reel beauty in the third period. “It was a game that we probably needed, since we’ve been in so many close games, to get some guys some confidence scoring some goals. It was good to see a lot of guys step up.”

Corey Crawford made 18 saves for his 13th victory, and Johnny Oduya and Duncan Keith had the Blackhawks’ other goals.

“We had all areas of our game with us, puck possession, playing a sound-game system-wise. Everybody contributed,” Chicago coach Joel Quenneville said.

The Blackhawks are 2-2-0 since their record 21-0-3 streak to start the season.

Defenseman Trevor Daley scored for the Stars, who have been outscored 16-3 in losing four straight (0-3-1). Three games into a stretch in which the Stars play nine of 11 at home, they have lost all three and are 2-5-1 in their last nine in Dallas.

“If this wasn’t an alarm clock, I don’t know what is,” Stars coach Glen Gulutzan said.

The return of offensive catalyst Jamie Benn, who missed two games with a wrist injury, wasn’t enough to help the Stars, although he assisted on Dallas’ only goal, feeding Daley for a one-timer on a power play at 6:30 of the third period to spoil Crawford’s shutout bid.

Kari Lehtonen took the loss in goal for Dallas, surrendering four goals on 17 shots before he was pulled midway through the second period. Richard Bachman made 13 saves in relief.

“We dumped on our first goalie and we dumped on our second goalie,” Benn said. “We left them to hang out to dry and it’s unacceptable. We need to do something within this room to change that. It’s an unacceptable effort tonight. These guys gave us a wakeup call tonight.”

Toews struck twice within 1:35 to propel Chicago to a 2-0 lead in the first period and the Blackhawks never looked back.

At 9:05, Toews cruised through the top of the crease and his nifty deflection of Leddy’s slap shot from the left point beat Lehtonen.

His second goal came seconds after he won an offensive zone face-off, and set up in front of the net, where Duncan Keith’s point shot ricocheted off Daley right to him for an easy tap-in into the open side of the net at 10:40.

“I think maybe the fact that we were able to distance ourselves early and not let them back into the game maybe took the wind out of their sails,” said Toews, who has 13 goals. “And as the game went along, the puck just seemed to keep bouncing our way. We worked for our success. I think whether you score eight goals or not, we did what we had to do to win and played a full 60 minutes.”

The Blackhawks extended their lead to 3-0 on Leddy’s third goal of the season at 17:54. Lehtonen stopped Viktor Stalberg’s point-blank shot, but Leddy managed to jam home the rebound.

Chicago continued to control the action in the second, nearly going up by four at 7:30 when a turnover by Dallas rookie defender Brenden Dillon gave Jimmy Hayes an uncontested wrist shot from the slot, but he fired it over the crossbar.

Oduya made it 4-0 at 8:01 when his slap shot from the blue line sailed past a screened Lehtonen, pinged off the left post and dropped in for his second goal in as many games.

That goal prompted Gulutzan to pull Lehtonen in favor of Bachman.

The Blackhawks scored on their first shot against Bachman, taking a 5-0 lead at 12:18 while the clubs were skating four aside, on Hossa’s one-timer from in front off a nifty backhand pass from Kane.

“We were talking about it before the shift,” Hossa said of the play, “and I knew as soon as he went on the right side, he’d throw it in the middle and I tried to just try to find a way to best position myself to score the goal.”

Skating with a 5-on-3 advantage, Chicago struck again with 50.8 seconds left in the period when Hossa launched a blistering snap shot from the right circle that beat Bachman over his glove.

Keith’s second goal of the year, off a wrist shot that glanced off Benn’s stick in front, beat Bachman at 2:06 of the final period.

Two minutes after Daley snapped the shutout in the third period, another Dallas goal was wiped out. Eric Nystrom’s wrist shot found its way over Crawford’s shoulder, but the officials ruled that Vernon Fiddler interfered with Crawford on the play.

“We certainly got humbled,” Stars captain Brenden Morrow said. “We knew they were a good team coming in. We’d like to think we were prepared for it and expected it, but obviously we weren’t. This was deflating for us. We’ve got some work to do.”

Kane made it 8-1 on the ensuing power play with a spin move in the right circle for a backhander that beat Bachman past the glove at 9:59.

Game notes

Daley’s goal snapped an 0-for-10 power play drought for the Stars over the past three games. … After a 2-for-6 showing with the man-advantage, Chicago is 5 for 21 over its last nine contests on the power play. … The Stars honored their general manager, former C Joe Nieuwendyk, as part of their all-time team. Nieuwendyk played in Dallas from 1995-2002, winning the Conn Smythe Trophy in 1999 while helping the Stars earn the franchise’s only Stanley Cup.

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Seabrook collapsed on the ice late in the first period Sunday and had to be helped to the locker room after he was struck in the groin area with a slap shot. He returned to the ice at the start of the second period and finished the game. He had one goal and one assist in Sunday’s 3-2 win over the Los Angeles Kings.

“Day to day, hopefully we can get him on the ice the next day or so,” Quenneville said of Seabrook after Tuesday morning’s skate at the United Center.

Seabrook, who along with Duncan Keith has comprised the team’s top defensive pairing, is second on the team with 23:32 of average ice time. He also has two goals, six assists and a plus/minus rating of plus-3.

Quenneville said he was unlikely to break up the team’s second defensive pairing of Johnny Oduya and Niklas Hjalmarsson, who have combined for a plus-18.

Nick Leddy, Sheldon Brookbank or Michal Rozsival will likely replace Seabrook on the top defensive pairing against the Canucks on Tuesday night.

Goaltender Corey Crawford, meanwhile, resumed skating but will miss his third consecutive game with an upper-body injury.

“Corey skated prior to practice, did well, so we’ll get him out there again tomorrow,” Quenneville said. “Hopefully, he keeps progressing here.”

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