ANAHEIM, Calif. — The New Jersey Devils failed to sustain their momentum from a pair of decisive home victories into Game 3 of the Stanley Cup Finals. Now they know they're in a series.
When Ruslan Salei's goal eluded Martin Brodeur at 6:59 of overtime, giving the Anaheim Mighty Ducks a 3-2 victory Saturday night, the Devils retreated to their dressing room knowing that they missed a chance to sweep the series.
After the Devils limited the Ducks to 16 shots in each of their consecutive 3-0 home wins, New Jersey allowed 18 shots through the first two periods and 33 overall.
Right from he start, the Devils realized it would take more than a one-man advantage for their struggling power play to score against Jean-Sebastien Giguere. They were 0-for-4 on the power play.
John Madden was cross-checked by Steve Thomas just 15 seconds after the opening face-off, but the Devils failed to capitalize. They got another chance at 3:58 of the first period when John Leclerc was sent off for slashing — but came up empty again as Giguere displayed the form that held Minnesota to one goal in the Ducks' four-game semifinal sweep.
Anaheim's Marc Chouinard opened the scoring at 3:39 of the second, moments after Brodeur went behind his net to clear the puck and turned it over to Anaheim defenseman Sandis Ozolinsh.
The goal ended Brodeur's scoreless streak at 143 minutes, 39 seconds, leaving him second in the record books behind Toronto's Frank McCool, whose 1945 streak of 188:35 made him the only goalie in Finals history to post three straight shutouts.
The Devils pulled even at 14:02 of the period when Patrik Elias beat Giguere just under the crossbar with a short wrist shot after Jamie Langenbrunner spotting him cruising down the slot.
The Devils fell behind again just 45 seconds later when Brodeur came a few feet out of his crease to steer a dump-in by Ozolinsh to the right circle — and lost his grip on his stick as the puck trickled across the goal line. To add insult to injury, Giguere was credited with an assist.
New Jersey got a break in the third period when rookie defenseman Kurt Sauer tried to knock down a fluttering puck between the circles in the Anaheim zone and Grant Marshall got control of it before taking a 25-foot wrist shot that Scott Gomez redirected for his third goal of the playoffs.
Two more wins also would erase the sour taste Devils coach Pat Burns still has in his mouth from his first trip to the finals in 1989 with Montreal, when Calgary beat the Canadiens in six games. Only four coaches have won the finals in their second try after losing the first time — Jack Adams, Dick Irvin, Glen Sather and Bob Johnson.
The Devils trailed 2-1 in the second after one of the biggest misplays of Brodeur's career, as he lost his stick and couldn't defend Sandis Ozolinsh's seemingly harmless shot as it trickled in from the blue line.
It was a perfectly awful play by the goalie who was near perfect for the first seven periods of the series.
But the Devils tied it at 2 when Scott Gomez deflected Grant Marshall's wrister from above the right circle past Giguere at 9:11 of the third. Gomez has two goals in the finals after scoring only once in 16 games.
That might have won it had Brodeur not made a grievous mistake on a play that couldn't have been more routine.
Only 45 seconds after the Devils' Patrik Elias tied it at 1, Giguere fed the puck up ice to Ozolinsh who, draped by two Devils, pushed it toward the net.
Brodeur, positioned at the left of the crease, began to scramble over to play the puck, only to drop his stick. With Brodeur unable to defend, the puck trickled into the side of the net as the goalie dropped to his knees, raising his hand to his head in disbelief.
The maddening misplay at 14:47 of the second came slightly more than 11 minutes after Ozolinsh set up Anaheim's first goal of the series, by the infrequently used Marc Chouinard. That goal at 3:39 of the second ended Brodeur's scoreless streak of 143 minutes, 39 seconds, the second-longest to start the finals.
Ozolinsh shot the puck toward the net from along the boards, and it deflected off Chouinard's stick and past Brodeur to the glove side. The Devils scored the first goal in each of the first two games on their home ice, and the Ducks never challenged after that in either game.
Chouinard was scratched for the Ducks' last five games before the finals and had only three goals all season.
The first period was scoreless for the third straight game, but the tempo was much different from the first two games. The Mighty Ducks, challenged Friday by Giguere to be more emotional and physical, were both — sometimes to their disadvantage.
Steve Thomas, playing in his first finals at age 39, tried to set the tone from the start, only to draw a cross-checking penalty 15 seconds in. Mike Leclerc drew another for slashing about 3 1/2 minutes later.
However, New Jersey's power play, the second-worst in the league during the regular season, didn't convert either time. The Devils' power play is only 11-of-72 in the playoffs.
Anaheim star Paul Kariya, held without a shot in Game 3 for the first time in 30 playoff games, had his best scoring chance of the series with about four minutes left in the first period, but Brodeur stopped his rebound attempt from along the goal lin