The Wild appeared to score the go-ahead goal on a power play midway through the third period Tuesday night when Kirill Kaprizov poked a stray puck in the crease into the net.

But an on-ice official already had blown his whistle, and there was nothing the Wild could do about it.

No matter. Minutes later, Vinni Lettieri scored the go-ahead goal at even strength — his first goal since Dec. 18 — as the Wild held off the Ottawa Senators, 3-2, at Xcel Energy Center.

Mason Shaw scored his first goal since last March, and Matt Boldy scored his 26th of the season for Minnesota, which pulled within six points of Los Angeles for the Western Conference’s second wild-card spot with eight regular-season games left.

Marc-Andre Fleury stopped 30 shots, including a shorthanded breakaway by Ridley Greig seconds before the Wild appeared to have scored the go-ahead goal. Senators goaltender Joonas Korpisalo stopped two chances in a scrum before sitting down, presumably on the puck.

An official blew the whistle, but the puck had leaked out into the left corner of the crease, where Kaprizov was waiting. But the play was already blown dead.

But Shaw helped create the go-ahead goal when he chased down a loose puck in the Ottawa zone and sent it toward the net. The puck hit a Senator’s stick but found its way to the slot, where Lettieri was waiting. He corralled it and scored on a no-look backhander at 13:04.

Jake Lucchini won a defensive battle on the wall to start the rush, and Shaw recovered the puck. Skating north, he passed to Zach Bogosiam, racing down the right boards, and the Wild quickly had a 3-on-2 with Vinni Lettieri in the center.

With Shaw racing to the corner of the crease, Bogosian sent a pass across the circles, and Shaw softly one-timed it past Korpisalo into the far corner for a 1-0 lead at 12:32 of the first period.

The Wild quickly added to that lead in the second period when Kaprizov centered a pass into the slot, whence Boldy swept the puck past Korpisalo for a 2-0 lead just 49 seconds into the period.

That seemed to get Ottawa’s attention, and the Senators generally outplayed Minnesota for the rest of the period. With Marat Khusnutdinov in the box for hooking, Drake Batherson cut the lead in half when he finished a sharp power play by flipping a stray puck over a diving Marc-Andre Fleury and into the far top corner at 7:43.

The Wild drew a power play late, when Shane Pinto was sent to penalty box slashing with 29 seconds in the period, but the Wild couldn’t do much with it at the end of the second or start of the third.

Ottawa, however, made hay on another power play after Jonas Brodin was called for slashing at 1:57. The Senators used a set play to get Fleury out of position. Jakob Chychrun one-timed a pass from behind the net by Batherson to tie the game 2-2 at 2:42.

Korpisalo, pulled with just under two minutes to play, stopped 17 shots.

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