OTTAWA -- In the span of 24 hours, the New Jersey Devils were able to accomplish something they haven't done in more than a month -- string together two wins in a row.

Goalie Cory Schneider made 36 saves for his third shutout of the season and 20th of his career to lead the Devils to a 3-0 victory over the Ottawa Senators on Wednesday night at Canadian Tire Centre.

The result allowed the Devils (19-14-5) to move past the Senators (18-14-6) into the final wild card spot in the Eastern Conference while giving New Jersey its first pair of consecutive wins since Nov. 12-14.

The Devils defeated the Carolina Hurricanes 3-2 on Tuesday.

"Hopefully this is the start of (a run)," said Schneider. "It seems like every team that makes the playoffs goes on a run at some point, an extended four, five or six game winning streak or multiple three, four game winning streaks down the stretch here. If we want to put ourselves in a position to be in the playoffs towards the end of the year here we have to start stringing these together."

Winger Mike Cammalleri sparked the Devils with two first-period goals, his 13th and 14th of the season. Winger Lee Stempniak had the other New Jersey goal into an empty net with 15.6 seconds left.

Goalie Andrew Hammond made 18 stops for the Senators, whose home-ice winning streak was stopped at five games.

"Overall I think we were hungry, we played well," said Hammond. "But at the end of the day we came up empty.

"It's one of those games where you know they're not going to give you too much. Credit their goalie, he played really well."

The Senators outshot their opponents for just the 11th time in 38 games this season.

"I just felt they were pretty opportunistic with their two goals," said Hammond. "We didn't give them a ton all night, and from that standpoint I think defensively, it was probably a step in the right direction.

"But you don't really want to get into the habit of taking any morale victories."

Cammalleri scored his first goal during a power play at 9:11 of the first period. After taking the puck from Senators defenseman Erik Karlsson at the New Jersey blue line, he raced down ice and beat Hammond with a low shot to the stick side.

Cammalleri's second of the night came a little over nine minutes later. From a standing position near the top of the left face-off circle, he took a pass from center Travis Zajac, and wired a shot past Hammond high on the stick side.

"We'd like to get on a roll here," said Cammalleri. "It was big for us to win two in a row. Three would feel a lot better than two.

"We've been kind of flirting in and out of (the playoff picture) all year so I don't know what (getting into the eighth spot now) does or doesn't do. We'd like to really be proud of the way we can play our game and hopefully that means some results for us on a consistent basis."

While the Devils power play finished 1-for-3, Ottawa was 0-for-4 with the man advantage.

"Maybe our (lack of) discipline hurt us," said Senators winger Mark Stone, who admitted the edge in shots on goal was misleading. "We got a lot of pucks to the net, but we didn't have a lot of traffic at the net. We got some pretty good looks. He made some good saves, but he didn't have to make enough high quality saves."

New Jersey coach John Hynes thought otherwise, saying Schenider was a difference maker.

"He was there for us when we needed him," said Hynes. "He made some big saves, but I thought led by Corey, it was a good, strong team win. We were able to score two goals and played well enough to get it done.

"We knew coming into the game this was, I think, one of the top five offensive teams in the league in goals for. We knew there were going to be surges and things like that. I thought our net front defense was really strong and Corey played well. We didn't allow a lot of second shots, second rebounds. The strong defense around the goal was key, particularly late."

Senators coach Dave Cameron liked the way his team performed in responding to a 7-3 loss in Boston on Tuesday.

"I thought we played real well. Give Jersey credit. We made a couple of errors in the first period and they buried both of them.

"I thought after that we did a lot of good things, got a lot of good looks, got a lot of good chances. Their goalie played really well today."

Cameron added that being out of the playoff picture is significant, even with more than three months left in the season.

"I hope it ups the urgency moving forward here," he said. "We knew it was going to be a dogfight, and it's a dogfight."

NOTES: Senators D Jared Cowen, a former first-round pick, was a healthy scratch. Ottawa recalled D Fredrik Claesson from AHL Binghamton to play his first NHL game. ... Devils RW Mike Sislo was activated for his first NHL game of the season and the 25th of his career. Sislo leads AHL Albany with 13 goals, including nine on the power play. ... Devils C Tyler Kennedy was scratched. ... Senators F Curtis Lazar returned to the lineup after missing two games with a groin injury. To make room, coach Dave Cameron made a healthy scratch of LW David Dziurzynski. ... Senators G Andrew Hammond played his first home game since Nov. 12, when he was sidelined by a concussion.