Brodeur rests, Isles clinch playoff spot

The New York Islanders beat the New Jersey Devils in the shootout on Sunday afternoon. The victory gave the Islanders the last playoff spot in the East. They overtook Toronto on the last day of the regular season. The Isles will face the Sabres in the first round.

The Islanders took a two goal lead on tallies by Richard Park. The Devils got on the scoreboard when Madden scored with 4:13 remaining in the third period. He scored again
with less than one second remaining to send the game into overtime.

The game eventually went to the shootout. Parise scored for the Devils, Satan and Kozlov scored for New York Islanders. Dubielewicz stopped Brian Gionta and Sergei Brylin to win the game and send the Isles in the post season.

Martin Brodeur did not play on the last game of the season. He took a day off in a game that had no meaning for the Devils. Clemmensen played in Brodeur's place in only his fourth start of the season.

The Devils activated D Richard Matvichuk from the long-term injury list

Andy Greene and Cam Janssen were reassigned to Lowell.

The Devils will meet Tampa Bay on Thurday night to open the post-season. The Devils are seeded second and Tampa seventh. They have previously met in the 2003 conference semifinals. The Devils won that series in 5 games. That's also the series where Scott Stevens took a shot to the head from Pavel Kubina. Also he returned the next game, that shot probably contributed to his retirement in 2005.