DETROIT _ The inevitable became official Thursday night as the Red Wings were mathematically eliminated from the playoffs.
Their 1-0 loss to the Washington Capitals at Little Caesars Arena cemented what had been building for the past two-plus months: that the Wings were going to miss for a second straight year.
As has been the case much of the season, the Wings couldn't score. Not even a two-man, 2-minute power play could help them against the Capitals. Goaltender Philipp Grubauer was good, but the game was also another example of the Wings coming up short against a more talented team.
Brett Connolly scored at 6:41 of the third period after Xavier Ouellet lost the puck near Washington's blue line, creating an 2-0 rush with Jakub Vrana.
Andreas Athanasiou put the puck in Washington's net at 10:47 while Tyler Bertuzzi was distracting Grubauer. It turned out Bertuzzi was doing too good of a job; the Capitals challenged goaltender interference and a review showed they were right.
Neither side generated much in the way of good chances in the first period. The Wings had as good a chance as there comes to dent the scoreboard when Lars Eller and T.J. Oshie went to the penalty box at 12:24 of the second period.
Henrik Zetterberg's unit with Anthony Mantha, Martin Frk, Gustav Nyquist and Justin Abdelkader were on for all but the last 18 seconds, and Grubauer stopped slap shots from Mantha and Frk. Athanasiou fired a shot from the right circle during the last seconds of the two-man power play but also was stopped.
