Just two seasons ago the Devils embarrassed the Rangers when they swept them in the first round of the playoffs. Yesterday the Blue-shirts got a little pay back when they beat the Devils in five games to advance to the Atlantic Conference Semifinals.

Even though the Devils had home ice advantage that didn’t matter as the Rangers made themselves at home at The Rock by beating them in all three road games.

“I think obviously the first two on the road, winning those first two was really sending a statement,” said Sean Avery. “We have to give a lot of credit to our Ranger fans, coming into the Devil’s building it didn’t really seem like a road game. It really felt like a home game. They were so loud.”

Having so much support on the road paid off for the Rangers especially after Brian Gionta scored the first goal of the game just under five minutes in. The Rangers were able to take the wind out of the rival fans and energize their own by scoring just 18 seconds later on a goal scored by Michal Rozsival.

Less than two minutes after that Jaromir Jagr showed everyone that he can still shot when he scored a powerplay goal off a wrist shot from the point which put his team up 2-1. That goal was big but the next one would be bigger. With just under two minutes left in the first period Scott Gomez put the Rangers up 3-1 when he scooped up an Avery rebound.

The Rangers felt confident coming out in the second period with a two-goal cushion. They were able to stretch it to a three goal lead when Chris Drury scored on a wrist shot in front of the net off a crisp pass from the corner by Nigel Dawes. With the team up 4-1 nearly halfway through the game all they had to do was play defense to move on.

The Devils looked beat, but things took an interesting turn. A dump in by Bryce Salvador went off Brandon Dubinsky past Henrik Lundqvist to make it 4-2.

Then the Rangers began to pile up on penalties. It was Dubinsky who took and interference penalty on a questionable hit right before Marc Staal took a slashing penalty which gave the Devils a 5-on-3 powerplay advantage. Patrik Elias was able to capitalize on the play netting a goal to bring his team back to within one.

“It wasn’t easy,” Jagr said. “You feel like it’s over, then they score those two goals. I’m not saying you’re scared, but it wasn’t good.”

The Rangers were able to hold on defensively until in the third period John Madden broke loose of defensemen Fedor Tyutin and Dan Girardi. Fearing he would tie the game Girardi dove across the ice to knock the puck away from Madden, but instead took out his feet and Madden was awarded a penalty shot.

Everyone watching knew this was going to be a key play in the game, but Lundqvist came up huge for his team and totally shut down Madden.

“I was pretty aggressive,” said Lundqvist. “I was there with my glove and pad so his best chance was probably to go five-hole because there was a hole there, but I got my stick down. It was a pretty good move.”

There were about seven minutes left in the game after that and the Rangers were on lock down the rest of the way. Ryan Callahan came up especially big with strong defensive play behind the Devil’s net by holding onto the puck and killing off precious time.

“It was just a great play,” said head coach Tom Renney. “(Callahan) took almost 40 seconds off the clock inside the end zone altogether and probably 20 behind the net there. It was absolutely essential and really huge and you can imagine how that translates onto our bench and the next guys going out after that are going to do nothing less than that.”

Dubinsky then scored an empty netter to put the Rangers up 5-3 with just a minute left to play. At that point the game might have been over but not the tension. After the final seconds ticked off the clock the teams met at center ice to shake hands and Martin Brodeur refused to shake Avery’s hand.

“It talks about how un-classy I am,” said Avery. “Fatso there just forgot to shake my hand I guess. We out played them, I out played them and we’re going to the second round.”