NHL facing allegations of rigging Red Wings vs. Senators game and footage confirms it all

It was a heartbreaking loss for the Detroit Red Wings last night against the divisional foe Ottawa Senators, a 2-1 final score that dropped them 5 points behind in the chase for the final Wild Card postseason spot with time running out.

The game was won controversially by Ottawa, who was badly outshot by the Red Wings but scored a pair of power play goals; the winner was scored by Dylan Cozens late in regulation following an extremely questionable penalty call on Detroit's Moritz Seider.

Ottawa's Ridley Greig held Seider's stick and both players fell to the ice, but it was Seider who was whistled for a penalty; Ottawa then scored seconds later. In a cruel twist of fate, Cozens scored the winner for the Senators after he had been linked to the Red Wings for the last several weeks.

And as an even bigger gut punch to Red Wings fans, they appeared to tie the game in the final second of regulation only to have replays show that the clock ran out of time before Lucas Raymond's would-be tying goal crossed the goal line.

But seconds before, the clock appeared to tick away an extra second or two after the puck was covered by goaltender Linus Ullmark.

While the Red Wings can take comfort in the fact that if they play like they did against the Senators that they'll win more games than they lose, the harsh reality is that they've now dropped 6 straight games in regulation and have lost serious ground in the playoff race.

They have no choice but to beat their divisional foe Buffalo Sabres tomorrow night at Little Caesars Arena to not only stop the bleeding of their losing streak but to start picking up badly needed points.