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NEWARK, N.J. (AP) — The New York Islanders are back in the playoffs for the fifth time in six years because they responded to the midseason coaching change that saw Patrick Roy replace Lane Lambert.

Kyle Palmieri and Brock Nelson each had a goal and an assist and the Islanders clinched one of the two remaining playoff berths in the Eastern Conference with a 4-1 victory over the New Jersey Devils on Monday night.

The win assured that the Islanders and they will face the Carolina Hurricanes in the first round of the playoffs.

“We were unhappy with our spot and how we were performing to what we knew we were capable of,” Nelson said of the change. “So whether it was Lane or Patty, I think group still believed in what we have and sometimes a change or different voice just gives it a different perspective and right now it feels like we’re on a little bit of a role.”

Jean-Gabriel Pageau and Kyle MacLean also scored as the Islanders secured third place in the Metropolitan Division. Semyon Varamov made 23 saves for his fifth straight win and helped New York extend its point streak to eight games (7-0-1).

“It wasn’t the prettiest of hockey games, we capitalized in our opportunities,” Islanders captain Anders Lee said. “But something like this happens; we put ourselves in the playoffs and it’s a culmination of 81 games of work and everything in between. So guys should be proud of it, we’ll enjoy it here for a little bit.”

The run also was evidence general manager Lou Lamoriello made the right move when he fired Lambert on Jan. 20 with New York’s season slipping away after losing four straight and posting a 2-6-2 stretch during which they played poorly.

Roy came aboard and found ways to press the right buttons, leading the team to a 19-12-5 record, with their best hockey coming late with everything on the line. Lambert, who led the Islanders to the playoffs in his first season in 2022-23, was 19-15-11 when he was sacked.

“They played some very good hockey down the stretch and they were resilient,” Roy said. “They worked together. I think we learned how to win and what I love is again tonight it was a 2-1 score and I felt like we were calm and we didn’t change our game and that’s a really good sign.”

The win assured that the Islanders and they will face the Carolina Hurricanes in the first round of the playoffs.

Timo Meier scored for the Devils, who missed the playoffs a year after posting a franchise-record 112 points. Jake Allen had 14 saves in New Jersey’s final game of the season.

“It’s definitely tough,” Meier said. “The year is done, you miss the playoffs, that’s not where we want to be. And now it’s time to take some time off. You know, everybody’s going to look in the mirror, evaluate their performance. We’re disappointed.”

New Jersey also fired its head coach this season, letting veteran Lindy Ruff (30-27-4) go on March after a 1-2 West Coast trip. Associate head coach Travis Green was named the interim coach but the team didn’t respond and it went 8-12-1 the rest of the season.

Green said he will meet with general manager Tom Fitzgerald and they will discuss his future. At the least, he probably will get an interview if Fitzgerald conducts a coaching search.

The Islanders, who close the season Wednesday at home against the Penguins, never trailed as Pageau scored on a 2-on-1 with Pierre Engvall with 7:38 left in the first with their first shot of the game. Palmieri doubled the lead with 3:08 remaining with his 29th goal, a tip on a power play.

Meier cut the deficit to a goal early in the second period for his 29th. However, Nelson restored the two-goal lead with 8:12 remaining in the period with his 33rd and MacLean, put the game away, scoring in close in the third period.

With the Devils out of playoff contention heading into their final game, Islanders fans were able to scoop up tickets and they celebrated more as more as New York’s lead increased.

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Devils: season over.

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NEW YORK — Artemi Panarin had a goal and an assist, Igor Shesterkin made 26 saves for his fourth shutout of the season, and the New York Rangers beat the Ottawa Senators 4-0 on Monday night to clinch the Presidents’ Trophy for the NHL’s best regular-season record.

Jack Roslovic, Adam Fox and Alexis Lafreniere also scored, and Chris Kreider had two assists as the Rangers won their league-best 55th game and finished with 114 points — both franchise records — and will have home-ice advantage throughout the playoffs.

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New York won for the fifth time in seven games and went 26-7-1 in their last 34 games. They previously won the Presidents’ Trophy in 1991-92, 1993-94 — when they won the Stanley Cup for only time since 1940 — and 2014-15.

Roslovic, who was acquired from Columbus on March 8, scored his third goal with the Rangers and ninth overall this season at 5:55 of the first, beating Ottawa goalie Joonas Korpisalo by finishing off a 2-on-1 passing play with Kreider.

Fox made it 2-0 with a short-handed goal at 8:58 of the second. Fox finessed a pass from Kreider past Korpisalo for his 17th goal of the season with Kaapo Kakko – playing his 300th NHL game – in the penalty box for slashing. Fox has the most goals by a Rangers defenseman since Brian Leetch scored 21 in 2000-01.

Panarin made it 3-0 with his 49th goal at 4:34 of the third. Panarin finished with 120 points — second-most in Rangers history — and with points in a franchise-record 67 of his 82 games this season.

Panarin had a chance for his 50th with a late Rangers power-play but Korpisalo denied him twice.

Lafreniere made it 4-0 with seven minutes remaining in the third with his 28th, concluding a pretty setup from Panarin and defenseman Erik Gustafsson.

Kreider finished with 75 points, including 39 goals, for the second-highest points total of his career.

Shesterkin won seven of his last nine starts to finish the regular season at 36-17-2. In 22 games since Feb. 12, the 28-year-old Russian netminder was 16-5-1 with four shutouts.

The Rangers finished 30-11-0 at home, winning 15 of their last 19 contests at Madison Square Garden. The 30 home wins tied the 1970-71 squad for most in franchise history.

The Senators will miss the playoffs for the seventh straight season. The last time Ottawa reached the postseason was in 2017 when they defeated the Rangers in six games in a second-round series.

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“There’s a ceiling on our physical capacities. There’s no ceiling on mental capacity. You can always just keep building in that regard. The guys that are great goalies or have been great goalies. . . that’s kind of what they’re always preaching. It’s all up top.”

— Thatcher Demko, January, 2022

VANCOUVER — In the 53 weeks before Thatcher Demko sprained his knee last month, the Vancouver Canucks’ starter displayed the technical and physical abilities that make him one of the best and most efficient goaltenders in the hockey universe.

In the next couple of weeks — and, he hopes, long beyond — Demko has the chance to show the extent of his mental capacities and the strength of the mind that drives his game.

After missing 14 games with his knee injury, Demko is expected to finally return to the crease Tuesday night against the Calgary Flames in Game 81 of Vancouver’s regular season — the second-to-last game the Canucks have to prepare for the franchise’s most important playoff appearance since losing the 2011 Stanley Cup Final.

The timing of Demko’s injury was, as my analytics friends like to say, sub-optimal.

But the general preoccupation with the low number of reps the 28-year-old goalkeeper has to prepare for his first non-COVID playoffs largely ignores a more vital factor in Demko’s return: his mental strength.

For better or worse, the goalie from San Diego has always been a deep thinker. When he graduated high school a year early to enrol at Boston College, it was a degree in applied psychology he undertook. There was a philosophy minor, which included a religious studies course one summer because Demko wanted to understand our fracturing world a little better.

Demko knows how to think. He knows how to focus.

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The lack of a runway for him ahead of the playoffs heightens the importance of his mental preparation in dealing with the immediate necessity to perform well and then cope with the great unknown of the playoffs to come.

“I mean, as a goalie, we have one job: just stop the puck,” Demko said after moving away from the media herd following Monday’s practice at Rogers Arena. “We’re not thinking about systems or different strategies and things like that. If the puck comes to me, I’ve got to try and get in the way of it. It’s pretty simple.

“I can’t speak on (playoff hockey) too much because my only playoff experience is in the bubble. But I think we’re all high-performance athletes and we’re all kind of geared to focus on the task at hand. Obviously, the atmosphere is going to raise the intensity level. That’s kind of just inherently how it’s going to be. And I have high hopes for our group and for myself as far as being able to rise to the occasion.”

None of the Canucks’ core players except for veteran centre J.T. Miller has experienced the emotional frenzy and physical ferocity of actual playoff hockey in the National Hockey League, and this inexperience is a genuine issue the team must navigate.

Coach Rick Tocchet and several more experienced Canucks have been talking for weeks about this theme.

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But beyond the emotional charge, the game doesn’t change for goalies during the playoffs nearly as much as it does for skaters. Opponents will try to physically obliterate Canuck defenceman Quinn Hughes. Scorers Elias Pettersson and Brock Boeser are going to find it exponentially more difficult (and painful) to play in front of the net. Everyone’s battle level must go up. The game gets faster.

But for goalies, the challenge is unchanged: see the puck, stop the puck, block out everything else.

“I would say that’s a very fair assumption,” Canuck backup Casey DeSmith said. “The skaters have to deal with the extra physicality, the extra intensity, especially the physical aspect. Goalies, yeah, the game kind of comes to you and you have your crease and you have your net to cover. You know, there might be a couple of extra bodies in front and there might be a little bit of extra fighting for the net front. But I think in general you tend to see playoffs be more defensive-oriented than regular season, and I think that goalies can really thrive in that (situation).”

Despite spending 37 days on long-term injured reserve, Demko remains seventh among NHL goalies with 34 victories in 49 starts, and his .917 save rate is second among starters to Connor Hellebuyck’s .922 in Winnipeg. The Canuck is second in goals-saved-above-average in all situations, according to naturalstattrick.

As if clinching the Pacific Division title isn’t a big enough emotional lift for the Canucks, the return of Demko provides a further boost. 

“Yeah, I think that’s a huge part,” Tocchet told reporters. “Since he’s been out, he’s at the rink twice a day. He’s by himself sometimes with a therapist. He’s here at 7 am, here. . . at 7 pm. He’s worked really hard to get to this position. Like, really hard. He has probably accelerated the (recovery) process because he worked so hard. I think that’s contagious. It just shows other players, you know, the dedication and how bad he wanted to come back and help this team.

“The big-time goalies, you can just tell when there’s pressure that hits you, they’re not flipping and flopping. They’re not diving all over. They continue with their style. It doesn’t matter if the team’s all over us or they’re not, (Demko) stays who he is. That’s why I love him — that he is who he is during any part of the game.”

Any game. Any time.

“I think if there’s anyone who could just step right back in and be a world-class goaltender in the playoffs, it’s Demmer,” DeSmith said. “He has all the physical tools; that is not a news flash for anyone. But mentally, I think maybe this was a good break, a good re-set after a really great year but a really long year. I’m under the impression that he’s probably the freshest guy in the room. Mentally, he’s really pumped to be back, excited to get back in the net and play games and be part of the team again, and carry this team like he had for so long this year. I have all the faith in the world in him. Everybody does.”

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TORONTO — Monday marked Jackie Robinson Day across MLB and to commemorate the occasion during batting practice, the Toronto Blue Jays sported black T-shirts adorned with the words, “Breaking Barriers.” 

It was a unique look much different than the standard team-issued apparel worn by players before games, but on this day, Blue Jays infielder Isiah Kiner-Falefa stood out even more than everyone else. He was the only player on the field dressed in all-white and Kiner-Falefa’s sleeveless hoodie featured the words, “Barriers Broken” and “Bonds Formed,” along with a silhouette of Robinson and his No. 42 in gold lettering. 

The hoodie, designed by The Players Alliance, was given to Kiner-Falefa after he made a donation to the organization. Established in 2020, The Players Alliance is a non-profit — comprised of 150 current and former MLB players — with the goal of increasing African American representation in the sport.

“I’m half-Samoan, quarter-Japanese and quarter-white,” said Kiner-Falefa, who was born and raised in Hawaii. “It’s just supporting the cause of breaking barriers and everything Jackie Robinson has done. I feel like there’s a lot of athletes that don’t have the opportunity and a lot of people who can really benefit from this game that don’t play this game.”

Kiner-Falefa is deeply passionate about representation in baseball as well as the principle of giving back. That’s partly due to his experience growing up in Hawaii, where the game is nowhere near as popular as it is in the mainland United States. 

Introduced to baseball at the age of five by his grandfather, Kiner-Falefa quickly developed a love for the game. His talent was evident from the time he was in the seventh grade and so his parents made the decision to enrol him on travel teams, a move that would help the infielder gain exposure while competing in tournaments across the U.S. 

Kiner-Falefa only had two college offers, so the draft represented his best chance at pursuing a career in baseball — he was selected by the Texas Rangers out of his Honolulu high school in the fourth round in 2013. 

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Ben Nicholson-Smith is Sportsnet’s baseball editor. Arden Zwelling is a senior writer. Together, they bring you the most in-depth Blue Jays podcast in the league, covering off all the latest news with opinion and analysis, as well as interviews with other insiders and team members.

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“It’s hard because there are no scouts — teams aren’t going to recruit in Hawaii,” said Kiner-Falefa. “(People) kind of make fun of it and say, ‘Scouts are going just for vacation.’ They don’t go as often as other places. You don’t have the scouts going there every day to watch you. So, there’s a lot of travelling and it’s a lot of money to get over here and to get in front of scouts. No matter how good you are, you have to be able to perform well in a limited sample size.”

When Kiner-Falefa was growing up, he looked up to the handful of Hawaiians who managed to carve out MLB careers, including Shane Victorino, Kurt Suzuki and former Blue Jays reliever Brandon League, among others. There isn’t a large list of players to choose from and that’s remained the case years later, with Kiner-Falefa now in his seventh big-league campaign.

At the start of the 2023 season, he was one of only six MLB players who identified as Hawaiian or as a Pacific Islander, according to the most recent Racial and Gender Report Card released by The Institute for Diversity and Ethics in Sport.

Such dearth has long inspired Kiner-Falefa’s efforts to get involved with youth baseball. He travelled to Samoa when he was in high school to help teach children about the sport and, in recent years, he’s participated in youth camps back in Hawaii. 

“There’s not many opportunities on the island,” said Kiner-Falefa, who signed a two-year, $15-million deal with the Blue Jays in the off-season. “So, just to be able to give back and open some doors means a lot to me.” 

While grassroots efforts are vital to grow the game, Kiner-Falefa believes there also needs to be a shift in mindset among young athletes on the island when they consider a potential future in baseball compared to other sports. 

“For a lot of people in Hawaii, their body frames and athleticism (could work in baseball),” he said. “If they’re not a football player, if they’re not a basketball player, if you’re not tall or if you’re not like a jacked guy, baseball is an avenue where size doesn’t matter. 

“No matter how big you are, no matter how small you are, you’re not getting picked based on, ‘Do I weigh 300 pounds and can I play linebacker?’ Baseball gives kids that don’t have the opportunities to excel in other sports a door to maybe get to college to help support their family.”

An important notion on any day, let alone one devoted to the memory of Jackie Robinson.

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