Ryan O’Reilly scored the only goal in the shootout Sunday night for the visiting Nashville Predators, who inched closer to clinching a playoff berth by edging the New Jersey Devils 3-2 in Newark, N.J.
O’Reilly shuffled the puck several times before sending a shot beyond the glove of Jake Allen.
Roman Josi scored in the first period and Luke Evangelista scored the game-tying power play goal in the third for the Predators (45-29-4, 94 points), who won for just the second time in six games but snapped a tie with the Vegas Golden Knights for the first wild-card spot in the Western Conference.
Nashville is nine points ahead of the St. Louis Blues and will clinch a playoff berth with one more point or one more loss by the Blues, who were playing the Anaheim Ducks later Sunday.
Predators goalie Juuse Saros made 23 saves in regulation and overtime before stopping all three Devils attempts in the shootout.
Jack Hughes and Chris Tierney scored for the Devils (37-36-5, 79 points), who are five points behind the Detroit Red Wings in the race for the second Eastern Conference wild-card berth, but have three other teams between them.
Allen recorded 29 saves in relief of Kaapo Kahkonen, who was injured while trying to stop Josi’s goal. He stopped four of five shots.
The Hughes brothers teamed up to put the Devils ahead 1:49 into the first. Luke Hughes sent a pass from the neutral zone to Jack Hughes, who bore in on Saros and fired a shot beyond his stick.
Kahkonen was injured on the Predators’ game-tying goal 6:50 later. After O’Reilly won a faceoff against Dawson Mercer, Josi fired a slap shot from just in front of the blue line that glanced off Kahkonen and trickled into the net. Kahkonen was writhing in pain afterward.
Following a scoreless second, the Devils took advantage of an untimely error by Saros to take the lead 2:11 into the third. Saros tried handing the puck off to Ryan McDonagh, but Tomas Nosek picked it off and passed to Tierney, who placed a point-blank shot beneath Saros’ legs.
Evangelista tied the score with 7:15 left in regulation, when he swooped into a crowd and put back the rebound of O’Reilly’s shot.
