New Jersey Devils Beat NY Rangers In Overtime, Advance To 2012 Stanley Cup Finals.

NEWARK, N.J. — A year after missing the playoffs for the first time since 1996, the New Jersey Devils are going back to the Stanley Cup finals, thanks to a rookie, a 40-year-old goaltender and a coach who'd never been to the postseason in the NHL.

How's that for a turnaround?

Adam Henrique scored off a wild scramble in front at 1:03 into overtime and the Devils defeated the rival New York Rangers, 3-2, in Game 6 of the Eastern Conference finals to advance to their first Stanley Cup finals since 2003.

The Devils will face the Los Angeles Kings for the Cup in a series that will start on Wednesday here.

This series win came against the Devils' most intense rival, and it was that much sweeter.

"That one was like Christmas," said Henrique, who also scored the series winner as Devils' first-round win over Florida.

It also was needed. The Devils' blew a 2-0 first-period lead and didn't want to head back to New York for a Game 7 on Sunday.

"It didn't matter how it got to overtime, we were in a good position," Devils captain Zach Parise said. "We were at home. We just needed one shot."

Actually, the Devils needed four shots to win the game.Henrique's winner came after Henrik Lundqvist stopped Ilya Kovalchuk twice and Alexei Ponikarovsky. The last shot lay in the crease and Henrique tapped it home.

Ryan Carter and Kovalchuk also scored for the Devils, whose biggest move this year was hiring Peter DeBoer as coach. He was fired by Florida after missing the playoffs in his three seasons. In his first postseason, he is hoping to lead New Jersey to its fourth Cup.

Ruslan Fedotenko and Ryan Callahan tallied for top-seeded New York, which had a good flurry just before New Jersey scored.

Henrique, who is nominated for the Calder Trophy – given to the NHL's top rookie – skated away from the crease and jumped against the end boards in the corner as his teammates hopped off the bench and mobbed him.

The six Rangers on the ice just stayed down in disbelief and frustration. This was very much like Game 5, which the Devils won 5-3. New York carried the play after the first period and had a 35-29 edge in shots.

But when it came time for a game-deciding play to be made, it was a Devil who made it.

"When they scored, it was such an empty feeling," said Lundqvist, who said the puck took a weird bounce on the final play. "It is shocking."

Henrique overcame injury to score this one. He seemed to take a stick from Brian Boyle in the groin area late in the third and had to leave the ice.

He felt no pain after the game winner.

All the Rangers could do was bow their heads and then line up for the traditional handshake after losing to their cross-rival rivals in a series that was close.

Martin Brodeur, 40, kept the Devils alive in the third. He stopped a power-play shot by Brad Richards, made a save on Artem Anisimov between the circles and used his stick to deflect a pass from the boards by Carl Hagelin in the final minute just before it got to Marian Gaborik on the edge of the crease.

"You could tell he was in the zone. He led us," Parise said. "He made some big saves tonight."

Lundqvist's best stop in the third was on Dainius Zubrus on a shot from behind the circles.

Facing elimination and down 2-0 after 20 minutes, the Rangers found their game in the second period and tied the game at 2-all on goals by Fedotenko and Callahan in a roughly four-minute span.

Defenseman Ryan McDonagh, who assisted on both goals, made the big play to get New York back in the game. He collected the puck above the left circle, skated around the net and tried a wrap around. The shot didn't go on goal but it turned out to be a perfect pass to Fedotenko who a tap-in into an open net at 9:47.

Callahan, who had a goal go off his leg in the Devils' 5-3 win on Wednesday, tied the game at 13:41 when Dan Girardi's shot from the right point deflected off his leg into the open lower corner of the net. Callahan's sixth of the postseason was set up when Brandon Dubinsky won a faceoff in the left circle.

Carter, who scored the game winner in New York on Wednesday night after the Devils blew a 3-0 lead, put New Jersey ahead again at 10:05 of the opening period.

The play started with a bad pinch at the point by Rangers defenseman Marc Staal. Steve Bernier led a 3-on-1 and found Stephen Gionta coming down the middle for a solo chance against Lundqvist. The Rangers goaltender stopped the shot, but Carter swatted the rebound home for his fourth of the playoffs.

Kovalchuk's seventh goal of the postseason and fifth on the power play was a thing of beauty. All five Devils skaters touched the puck with tape-to-tape passes with Dainius Zubrus finding Kovalchuk alone low in the left circle for a shot that Lundqvist had little chance to stop.

The Devils – as is the tradition for many Cup finalists – did not touch the Prince of Wales Trophy that was presented at center ice. As the team skated off to their locker room, "Glory Days," the 1984 hit from New Jersey rocker Bruce Springsteen serenaded them.

The game was played on the 18-year anniversary of the Rangers' dramatic, 4-2, Game 6 victory over New Jersey in the Meadowlands, a victory that pushed that classic series to a Game 7 and eventually led New York to its first Stanley Cup in 54 years. That game, of course, was preceded by a guarantee from Rangers captain Mark Messier, who delivered three goals en route to the victory.

This time, there's no Game 7.

NOTES: The Empire State Building's tower lights were lit in red and blue on Friday to cheer on the Rangers. ... Mogul and TV personality Donald Trump was at the game. ... Devils C Travis Zajac left the ice briefly in the second after being slashed on the left hand by the Rangers' Brandon Prust. No penalty was called. ... New Jersey is 4-1 in overtime in the postseason. New York finished 2-3.

Memorial Day 2012.

Memorial Day 2012.

While not officially Memorial Day my wife and I attended a funeral today in Arlington Cemetery; the funeral was near the Amphitheater and the Tomb of the Unknown, after the funeral my wife and I took a few minutes to walk up the hill to the Amphitheater.  Sir Moses Ezekiel VMI Class of 1866 designed the Amphitheater.  He is buried near by in Section 16 of Arlington, as he was a veteran of the Civil War having fought with Battalion of Cadets at the Battle of New Market on May 15, 1865.  Having never visited his burial site which is at the base of the Confederate Monument I thought it was appropriate.

In Virginia Confederate Memorial Day is celebrated on the same day as the national holiday.  According to Wikipedia, Memorial Day began as a celebration of those who had died during the Civil War.  Over time it has come to be a celebration of those who died in all wars.

It was fitting we visited Sir Moses Ezekiel grave.  Not only did he design the Amphitheater, but he also sculpted the Confederate War Memorial, and of course Virginia Morning Her Dead on the grounds of his Alma Mater the Virginia Military Institute.

Sir Moses Ezekiel was an unlikely Cadet.  He was not a member of the first families of Virginia, nor was he the son of a prominent businessman or planter or a communicant of the Episcopal Church.  He was from Richmond, but his father was not a businessman but a merchant, he was not an Episcopalian, but a Jew.  He would be the first Jew to attend VMI. 

His roommate at VMI, Thomas Garland Jefferson, was wounded at the Battle of New Market.  Ezekiel and another Cadet searched the battlefield to find him and carry him to Mother Crim house where he nurse him he died.  Ezekiel comforted his friend and roommate by reading to him from The Bible and the New Testament.  It is noted in his biography that he read to him from the Gospel of John, Chapter 14:

1 Let not your heart be troubled: ye believe in God, believe also in me.

2 In my Father's house are many mansions: if it were not so, I would have told you. I go to prepare a place for you.

3 And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again, and receive you unto myself; that where I am, there ye may be also.

4 And whither I go ye know, and the way ye know.

5 Thomas saith unto him, Lord, we know not whither thou goest; and how can we know the way?

6 Jesus saith unto him, I am the way, the truth, and the life: no man cometh unto the Father, but by me.

7 If ye had known me, ye should have known my Father also: and from henceforth ye know him, and have seen him.

8 Philip saith unto him, Lord, show us the Father, and it sufficeth us.

9 Jesus saith unto him, Have I been so long time with you, and yet hast thou not known me, Philip? he that hath seen me hath seen the Father; and how sayest thou then, Show us the Father?

10 Believest thou not that I am in the Father, and the Father in me? the words that I speak unto you I speak not of myself: but the Father that dwelleth in me, he doeth the works.

11 Believe me that I am in the Father, and the Father in me: or else believe me for the very works' sake.

12 Verily, verily, I say unto you, He that believeth on me, the works that I do shall he do also; and greater works than these shall he do; because I go unto my Father.

13 And whatsoever ye shall ask in my name, that will I do, that the Father may be glorified in the Son.

14 If ye shall ask any thing in my name, I will do it.

15 If ye love me, keep my commandments.

16 And I will pray the Father, and he shall give you another Comforter, that he may abide with you for ever;

17 Even the Spirit of truth; whom the world cannot receive, because it seeth him not, neither knoweth him: but ye know him; for he dwelleth with you, and shall be in you.

18 I will not leave you comfortless: I will come to you.

19 Yet a little while, and the world seeth me no more; but ye see me: because I live, ye shall live also.

20 At that day ye shall know that I am in my Father, and ye in me, and I in you.

21 He that hath my commandments, and keepeth them, he it is that loveth me: and he that loveth me shall be loved of my Father, and I will love him, and will manifest myself to him.

22 Judas saith unto him, not Iscariot, Lord, how is it that thou wilt manifest thyself unto us, and not unto the world?

23 Jesus answered and said unto him, If a man love me, he will keep my words: and my Father will love him, and we will come unto him, and make our abode with him.

24 He that loveth me not keepeth not my sayings: and the word which ye hear is not mine, but the Father's which sent me.

25 These things have I spoken unto you, being yet present with you.

26 But the Comforter, which is the Holy Ghost, whom the Father will send in my name, he shall teach you all things, and bring all things to your remembrance, whatsoever I have said unto you.

27 Peace I leave with you, my peace I give unto you: not as the world giveth, give I unto you. Let not your heart be troubled, neither let it be afraid.

28 Ye have heard how I said unto you, I go away, and come again unto you. If ye loved me, ye would rejoice, because I said, I go unto the Father: for my Father is greater than I.

29 And now I have told you before it come to pass, that, when it is come to pass, ye might believe.

30 Hereafter I will not talk much with you: for the prince of this world cometh, and hath nothing in me.

31 But that the world may know that I love the Father; and as the Father gave me commandment, even so I do. Arise, let us go hence.

Those who like Ezekiel had fought for the Confederate States of America surround Sir Moses in Section 16 Arlington National Cemetery.  Surrounded by those, who like himself, who had fought for their native states.

Sir Moses Ezekiel and all whom are buried at Arlington stand as silent sentinels who remind us that freedom is not free.

Sarah Palin Says Happy Memorial Day, Offers Best Wishes To Rolling Thunder.

Sarah Palin took to Facebook on Friday night to say, "Todd and I and our family would like to wish you all a happy Memorial Day weekend. We'd especially like to offer our best wishes to our friends in Rolling Thunder who will be taking part in their Ride for Freedom this weekend in D.C. as they do each year to honor our vets and specifically to bring awareness to POW/MIA issues. We were honored to join them last year."

She continued, "We were both sad to learn that Preston 'Jay' Fairlamb, Jr., one of the organizers of Rolling Thunder and someone who made us so welcome last year, tragically died in an accident last week. Jay was a Vietnam vet, a retired New Jersey State Trooper, and a great American who will be dearly missed. Please keep his wife, his children, grandchildren and his innumerable friends in your prayers."

The former Alaska governor included in her post a photograph of herself, Todd and Jay.

"On this Memorial Day weekend, may God bless our brave men and women in uniform," she said.

During Memorial Day weekend last year, Palin participated in the "Rolling Thunder" motorcycle ride, which begins at the Pentagon and culminates at the Vietnam Memorial. At the time, speculation was swirling around whether Palin would launch a campaign for the White House. Her 2011 motorcycle ride kicked off a bus tour of the eastern United States.

Below, a slideshow of photos capturing Palin's motorcycle ride last year: