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DETROIT (Ticker) -- Marcus Nilson did not see the biggest goal of his NHL career, but he'll probably never forget it.

Nilson converted a feed from Martin Gelinas and scored his first career playoff goal 2:39 into overtime to give the Calgary Flames a stunning 2-1 victory over the Detroit Red Wings in the opener of their Western Conference semifinal series.

"I didn't really see it," Nilson admitted. "I just heard guys screaming, so I figured it was in the net." Gelinas, the overtime hero in Game Seven of the conference quarterfinals at Vancouver, won a battle behind the net with defenseman Jiri Fischer and fed the puck to the bottom of the left faceoff circle. Nilson shoveled a one-timer past the glove of goaltender Curtis Joseph .

"It happened real quick," Joseph said. "It was a good shot. I wish I'd have gotten it, but unfortunately, I didn't."

Nilson's first goal since March 24 silenced Joe Louis Arena, where the top-seeded Red Wings won all three games in the first round against the Nashville Predators . But Detroit has dropped seven straight playoff overtime games at home.

Playing just three nights after ending their series with Vancouver, the Flames were outshot, 13-2, in the first period.

"We had a game plan, but we came out and we didn't execute," said Calgary center Craig Conroy said. "They really executed. After that first period, you're thinking, 'Holy cow, this is going to be long one.' ... Then they scored the first goal. We got very lucky, we stole this one."

The Red Wings had a first-period goal nullified by a goaltender interference penalty on Kris Draper . But they grabbed the lead at 6:14 of the second period off a fine individual effort by Robert Lang .

Lang cut between two defenders through the left faceoff circle, then went against the grain with a wrist shot from the edge of the right circle and beat Miikka Kiprusoff to the stick side.

Calgary tied it with 2:03 to go in the period as defenseman Robyn Regehr got the puck off the left boards and blasted a shot through four players and over the right shoulder of a crouching Joseph.

"We know that Joseph likes to go down, so you got to get the puck up," Regehr said.

Red Wings coach Dave Lewis blamed the loss on his team's power play, which went 0-for-6 against a team that surrendered a league-leading eight power-play goals in the first round.

"It's very disappointing, knowing that you start well, that you have home ice, but once again, it leads back to the power play," Lewis said. "That's the difference in a lot of games and for us, the momentum shifted because their penalty-killers killed our power play. As it turned out, one goal could have been huge and we didn't get that goal."

Calgary coach Darryl Sutter was proud of his team's discipline.

"We didn't take any bad penalties," he said. "The power plays are 6-3, but that's another part of the series that we're going to have to deal with because of the status of their club. We know that. We'll deal with it and not let it factor in."

Kiprusoff turned aside 28 shots and helped the Flames win the opener of a playoff series for the first time since the 1989 Stanley Cup Finals.

"It's huge, but that game's behind us," Kiprusoff said.