VANCOUVER, British Columbia -- After going scoreless through the Red Wings' first five games of the Stanley Cup playoffs, Brett Hull knew it was just a matter of time before something would go in for him.

	Hull

Saturday night's series-clinching 6-4 victory over the Vancouver Canucks came sooner instead of later as the attention-loving Hull showed his flair for the dramatic with a timely three-goal game.

"I just happened to get the puck in a couple good spots and they went in. Nothing more, nothing less," Hull said of his first career playoff hat trick.

After getting none of his 17 shots of the Western Conference quarterfinal series past Canucks netminders Dan Cloutier and Peter Skudra, Hull finally got on the scoreboard on a short-handed breakaway by faking Skudra to the ice and putting the Wings up 4-2 at 7:10 of the second period.

"I looked up, and the way I'd been going, all I saw was these big white pads," Hull said, alluding to his slump. "That's why I deked, and it was a funny deke because I was totally at a loss at what to do. And for a guy with almost 700 goals, I mean that's lucky I got a good angle and it went in."

Hull laughed about his shot on a tight angle as he almost ran out of room near the goal line to Skudra's left.

Relaxed after clinching the series and relieved that the Wings don't need to face the Canucks in a Game 7, Hull said that at 37 he wasn't putting any extra pressure on himself to score. Especially since he's not the sole go-to guy on a team with eight other future Hall-of-Famers.

"It's nice to see a guy like Brett come up with a big game in the most important game of the series in Game 6," said Wings center Igor Larionov, who assisted on two of Hull's goals. "Actually, all the games are important, but he was at his best tonight. So it's nice to see that firepower from other guys because he was quiet for five games."

When the Red Wings added Hull to their star-studded lineup last offseason, it wasn't to be a checker. So every goalless game, no matter how well he played, he'd face more questions about what happened to the touch of one of the most feared shooters in NHL history.

"That's what I do, that's what I base my game on; maybe not goals, but creating opportunities," Hull said. "If I didn't score and we would have lost, I don't think you would have written about how good I did the little things."

In the first period it looked liked Hull's hard luck would continue as he had time to wind up from the slot, only to have his shot deflect off Skudra's mask and into the corner.

"It was a good play. I got into a good spot to shoot it, shot it and it didn't go in," Hull said. "You just have to be patient and keep doing the little things away from that and hopefully you'll get the chances and they'll go in."

When that first one did go in, it was even a bigger goal for the Wings than it was personally for Hull. It came just 30 seconds after defenseman Nicklas Lidstrom scored short-handed during the same penalty in which the Red Wings outshot Vancouver 4-1 to thoroughly frustrate and deflate the Canucks.

Then Hull followed that up by putting a deadly wrist shot from the right circle high on Skudra's short side during a power play at 17:39 of the second period.

"With a player like him, he can sleep for one or two games and all of a sudden they wake up and they can score three goals. He has the best wrist shot in the world," said Detroit goaltender Dominik Hasek, no doubt glad to watch Hull shoot at the other end of the rink.

After Vancouver had cut the Detroit lead to 5-3, Hull restored the Wings' three-goal cushion with another power-play goal when Larionov, parked behind the Canucks' goal, found Hull open in the slot for a one-timer.

"I had two options," said Larionov, who had a goal and three assists in the game. "One was Steve Duchesne skating up the ice to the back door play. And I saw Brett Hull was by himself, so I made a play for him and he scored the goal."

After dropping the first two games in Detroit to the young, eighth-seeded Canucks, Hull's emergence capped off a series in which the Wings improved with each game in winning four straight. With poise and intelligence, the Wings' veteran experience conquered youthful exuberance.

"We won four games against a fantastic hockey team," Hull said, "and we should be proud of ourselves and go on and leave it and go on and work on the things we need to work on."

Though now that Hull is finally on target, the Red Wings probably have less to work on as they get ready to play either St. Louis or Los Angeles in the next round.

Jim Wilkie is an editor for ESPN.com's Page 2.