NHL PLAYOFFS : Devils Earn Another Chance to Take Next Step

The New Jersey Devils are only four victories and a short ride down the turnpike away from a trip to the Stanley Cup finals.

Claude Lemieux’s tie-breaking goal reversed Pittsburgh’s early domination and the Devils moved into the Eastern Conference finals against the Philadelphia Flyers by defeating the Penguins, 4-1, Sunday in Game 5 of their semifinals.

The Devils, who needed only 10 games to win their first two playoff series, advanced to the conference finals for the second consecutive season and the third time since moving to New Jersey from Colorado in 1982. They lost to the eventual Stanley Cup champion New York Rangers in a Game 7 overtime last season.

The Flyers and Devils will have plenty of time to get ready--their series won’t begin until Saturday in Philadelphia. “We want that next step,” Devil defenseman Scott Stevens said. “It only gets harder as it goes on, but we realize that.”

Goaltender Martin Brodeur once again controlled the high-scoring Penguins as Pittsburgh lost a playoff series in five games or less for the first time since 1979.

All but two of Pittsburgh’s eight goals in the series came from Ron Francis and Jaromir Jagr, but neither scored Sunday. The Penguins’ second and third lines were even more invisible.

“We didn’t see guys like [Tomas] Sandstrom, [Luc] Robitaille too much,” the Devils’ Shawn Chambers said. “That was good for us.”

Lemieux’s goal at 15:43 of the second, a relatively soft wrist shot from the right point off goaltender Ken Wregget’s blocker, gave the Devils a 2-1 lead and it allowed the Devils to slip back into their low-risk, mistake-free defensive style.

Chambers made it 3-1 at 6:27 of the third with the Devils’ second power-play goal of the game. Lemieux scored his second of the game and eighth of the playoffs--he had only six in the regular season--into an empty net with 18 seconds left.

NHL Notes

Detroit Red Wing captain Steve Yzerman has slightly torn cartilage in his right knee, will undergo an arthroscopy in the next several days and probably will sit out at least one game of the Western Conference finals against the Chicago Blackhawks, the team physician said Sunday. “There is a little flap or tear of the cartilage, the meniscus. It’s very small and it doesn’t look like there’s much to it. I expect him to be back in five to seven days after that,” David Collon told the Detroit News. The series starts Thursday.