NEWARK, N.J. -- New Jersey held a throwback promotion Wednesday night, breaking out the red-white-and-green uniforms the Devils wore when they moved here from Colorado in 1982.

Nice touch.

Pretty swell of the Penguins to cooperate, too, by playing some throwback hockey for part of the evening.

The wretched kind in which they specialized during the early and mid-1980s, when the Devils were putting down roots in this area.

The Penguins did not just self-destruct during their 5-2 loss at the Prudential Center, they self-immolated. They were guilty of some ghastly decisions and some breathtaking turnovers.

And most of those blunders had to be fished out of their net.

The victory gave the Devils a sweep of the six-game season series, and a tie with the Penguins for first place in the Atlantic Division.

New Jersey has a game in hand and an edge in the first tiebreaker, victories.

"We hurt ourselves," Penguins center Sidney Crosby said.

"That's what it came down to. Whether we were playing New Jersey or any other team, we would have had the same result. We really did hurt ourselves."

No one disagreed, and history suggests that if these teams meet in the playoffs this spring, the Devils should be a prohibitive favorite to advance to the next round.

According to the Elias Sports Bureau, four teams that swept a season series of six or more games from an opponent met that opponent in the playoffs that year. Each time, the team that earned the sweep won the playoff series. The most recent was Montreal against Boston in 2008.

The Penguins, presumably, are not aware of that stat, and, if they are, figure to ignore it.

"When you play in the playoffs, the past doesn't matter," Crosby said. "Whether you've won them all or spilt the season series or whatever."

Penguins center Evgeni Malkin skipped the game because of a bruised foot. Too bad some of his teammates did not take the night off as well.

Or, perhaps they did.

The Penguins actually dominated the first half of the opening period, and Chris Kunitz gave them a 1-0 lead when he buried a Bill Guerin rebound behind Devils goalie Martin Brodeur at 4:01.

But the course of the game was altered, dramatically and permanently, when Kris Letang lost the puck to Patrik Elias while trying to lug the puck out of his own zone. Elias fed it to Dainius Zubrus, who broke in alone and beat Penguins goalie Marc-Andre Fleury at 10:51.

Paul Martin, playing in his first game since being sidelined Oct. 24 by a broken arm, put New Jersey in front to stay at 18:18 and, after Fleury rejected Travis Zajac on a shorthanded breakaway at 2:48 of the second, the Penguins gave up another 21 seconds later.

tThis time, Elias, who had picked off a cross-ice pass by point man Jordan Leopold, scored to make it 3-1.

Zach Parise, on his knees at the front lip of the crease, punched in a rebound at 10:17 to drive Fleury, who allowed four goals on 13 shots, out of the game. At that point, coach Dan Bylsma said, no fewer than five of New Jersey's shots had come on breakaways.

Ruslan Fedotenko of the Penguins and New Jersey's Rob Niedermayer traded goals in the third. Not that anything that happened at that point mattered much, because the outcome had long since been decided.

"I don't feel like we played bad," Guerin said. "We just made big mistakes."

Just like old times.

Penguins Plus, a blog by Dave Molinari and Shelly Anderson, is featured exclusively on PG+, a members-only web site from the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette. Our introduction to PG+ gives you all the details.