Late scuffle mars Red Wings’ win

DETROIT – For nearly 60 minutes, the story was the Detroit Red Wings winning without their hottest player.

The fracas in the final seconds that spilled into the postgame, on the other hand , will be what people are talking about and might lead to suspensions.

Darren Helm and Henrik Zetterberg scored first-period goals to help make up for the loss of Johan Franzen and Detroit held on for a 2-1 win Saturday night over the Dallas Stars and a 2-0 lead in the Western Conference finals.

The game ended in ugly fashion as Chris Osgood used the handle of his stick to poke at Dallas’ Mike Ribeiro when he skated past the net. Ribeiro then slashed Osgood across the chest from behind the net.

Following some scuffling, Ribeiro was called for a match penalty and Osgood wasn’t penalized.

“Even if I did butt-end him, it was an accident,” Osgood said. “I was trying to protect our best player, Nick Lidstrom, so he didn’t get run.”

Ribeiro wasn’t around for interviews.

After watching a replay, Dallas coach Dave Tippett blamed Osgood for the fracas.

“Ribeiro is actually letting up on the guy and Osgood just sticks his stick out and butt-ends him,” Tippett said. “Ribeiro is not going to turn around and chop the goalie like that without having something happening. … I looked at it and said, ‘What’s he doing?’ until I went in and looked at the tape.”

Tippett was asked if he expected the NHL to suspend Osgood.

“That’s for the higher powers to figure out,” Tippett said.

The Red Wings scratched Franzen from the lineup, saying he would miss the following game because of concussion-like symptoms. He’s had recurring headaches since early in the previous series.

Franzen has scored an NHL-high 27 times since March 2, a 27-game roll that includes a league-high and franchise-record 12 goals in the postseason.