Martin Brodeur blasts ice quality

— -- NEW YORK -- New Jersey Devils goalie Martin Brodeur said every other ice he's played on during his 21-year career was better than the ice the New York Rangers and Devils skated on during Sunday's Stadium Series matchup at Yankee Stadium.

Said Brodeur: "... It was the worst ice I ever played hockey on."

Brodeur cited the poor ice conditions of the makeshift rink while discussing the delay at the beginning of the game that pushed the start from 12:30 p.m. ET to 1:41 p.m. The delay was due to the glare from the sun.

The veteran said there was no way the game could have started on time because it was so bright, and noted that there was a difference of roughly 10 degrees between the opposing ends of the rink. It was 24.9 degrees when the puck officially dropped in the Rangers' 7-3 victory.

Brodeur said the ice did not improve as the game progressed.

"When you went on it was worse and worse. It was tough," Brodeur said. "It was so cold out there."

Rangers coach Alain Vigneault also noted the poor condition of the ice. The rink was positioned horizontally stretching from the third base foul line to the first base foul line. The end near the third base foul line was the portion that was problematic during the pregame inspection.

"The only thing that I found surprising was the quality of the ice," Vigneault said. "You'd think that a day like this where it's below zero Celsius, so below 32 Fahrenheit, that you're talking about ideal conditions. You should be able to get ice and they had issues with the ice. I was surprised about that."

Devils forward Patrik Elias called the ice's quality "questionable."

"The conditions were what they were. Obviously it was tough, it was snowing," Elias said. "The quality of the ice was questionable. But you know that's going to happen going in but it's the same thing for both teams."