(Best E Casino) - The New Jersey Devils will try to avoid falling behind three games to none in the best-of-seven Eastern Conference quarterfinals tonight, as they visit the New York Rangers for Game 3 at Madison Square Garden.

The Rangers have jumped out to a 2-0 lead in this series by winning the first two games in New Jersey.

For New York its a continuation of a dominating regular season against the rival Devils. The Atlantic Division combatants also met eight times prior to the postseason and the Rangers went 7-0-1 in those outings with the lone setback coming in a shootout at New Jersey on the final day of the regular season.

The Blueshirts were 4-0 against Jersey at the Garden this year and have defeated the Devils in seven of the last nine meetings in Manhattan.

Jaromir Jagr and Sean Avery scored third-period goals 23 seconds apart in the third period to lift the Rangers to the Game 2 victory at the Prudential Center on Friday.

Henrik Lundqvist made 26 stops for the Rangers, who have never enjoyed a 2-0 series lead in any of their four prior playoff series against the Devils. However, New York has won three of the four all-time playoff series against New Jersey. The Devils did sweep New York in four games during the last meeting two years ago in the conference quarterfinals.

Scott Gomez picked up an assist in the victory, his fourth in two games in his first playoff series against his former club.

John Madden scored for the Devils, who face a two-games-to-none deficit for the first time since the 2006 Eastern semifinals, where they fell to eventual Cup champion Carolina in five games.

Martin Brodeur was solid in Friday's loss, making 28 saves.

Jagr broke a scoreless deadlock with a great individual effort at the 4:26 mark of the third. Skating with the puck from right to left behind the New Jersey net, he turned to the forehand along the goal line and slipped a wrister off Brodeur's shoulder.

Avery doubled the Rangers' advantage at 4:49, when he buried a wrister from the slot off a rebound from Daniel Girardi's initial chance.

The Devils pulled within 2-1 on Madden's deflection goal with 1:23 left, but a hooking call on Jamie Langenbrunner with 54 seconds to go negated any further New Jersey comeback attempt.

Jersey has just two goals in this series and is just 1-for-9 on the power play. The Rangers have also struggled on the man advantage as they've been held scoreless on six attempts over the first two games.

The series will stay in the Big Apple for Game 4, as the Rangers host another test at MSG on Wednesday.

New York had an impressive 25-13-3 record as the hosts this season, while the Devils were 21-15-5 as the visiting club.