"Part of our group is really understanding how do you win," Devils coach John Hynes said. "If you just take the example [Sunday], it's 4-2, we have the game, and then we take a penalty in the offensive zone behind the play. They score on the power play and then they get momentum. After that, they make a push and we stop doing little things that we were doing. We gave up two goals on bad wall play coming out of our zone.
"When you look at the big picture of the game we do lots of good things, but that's been the challenge to this group really the last six or seven games here, those things. It's understanding with a lead, you can't take bad penalties. It's when the puck gets rimmed around in your 'D' zone, how important that wall play is to get it out. We took a bad penalty and then we stopped playing, and it cost us."
Hall took the penalty when he cross-checked Nelson in the back at 6:06 of the third period. Aho scored on the power play at 7:58 to cut the Devils lead to 4-3.
Clutterbuck tied the game 4-4 at 15:43 off a terrific diagonal cross-ice, tape-to-tape saucer pass from Aho. Clutterbuck beat Schneider on the short side from the lower right circle.
"I was thinking shot in the beginning, but then their 'D' came up and took away the lane," Aho said. "I just saw [Clutterbuck] in my eye and just tried to get it to him."
The Islanders improved to 4-16-2 in games when they trail after two periods. They improved to 3-1 in the shootout.
