It’s that odd time of year between Christmas and New Year’s where it is easy to lose track of what day it is, what year it is, if you have to work tomorrow and other basics that are so cut and dried the other 51 weeks of the year.

Maybe that explains the Minnesota Wild seemingly losing track of where they were and what they were doing for some critical minutes on Sunday, as things slipped away in a 3-1 loss to the Ottawa Senators.

The Wild grabbed an early lead but could not add to it, as Josh Norris netted the game-winner for the Senators on a third-period power play, snapping a two-game Ottawa losing streak. Claude Giroux hit an empty-net goal in the final minute for the visitors.

Freddie Gaudreau supplied the only offense for the Wild with a first-period goal. They got 33 saves from goalie Filip Gustavsson, but saw their two-game winning streak and all of their good feelings they had collected with last Friday’s come-from-behind win in Dallas disappear.

“I just think it was certain aspects of our game weren’t there, and whether that’s a particular line or the team in certain areas too,” Wild coach John Hynes said. “Now with that being said, let’s be honest here, our power play could have, should have scored. We had looks that didn’t go in. What, we had four posts tonight? So we can talk about not generating offense and things like that. At the end of the day, we had opportunities, we didn’t get puck luck tonight to go in.”

The Wild’s struggling penalty kill had gone 3 for 3 versus the Stars, and killed a penalty midway through the third, only to see team captain Jared Spurgeon head to the box just seconds later.

On their second consecutive man advantage, Norris popped a quick shot over Gustavsson’s left shoulder to give the visitors their first lead with 7:18 remaining in regulation.

Gustavsson tipped his cap to Norris, with whom he was teammates with the Senators and their AHL team a few years ago.

“Yeah, he’s been doing that for as far as I’ve been playing with him in Belleville and Ottawa,” Gustavsson said. “He has a good shot and sometimes he scores.”

The Wild were being outshot and outplayed late in the first when Declan Chisholm caught a pass from Marcus Foligno and ripped a long-range shot that Gaudreau deflected into the upper right corner. It was just the seventh goal of the season for Gaudreau and his first since he had the only bright spot in a 7-1 home loss to Edmonton on Dec. 12. It was also the 50th goal of Gaudreau’s career.

Ottawa goalie Leevi Merilainen, making just his third start of the season, finished with 30 saves in the game and got some assistance from the goalposts, as Matt Boldy’s deflected shot in the first period and power-play shots by Mats Zuccarello and Spurgeon all struck the iron.

“I liked his game. He looked in control, looked composed,” Ottawa coach Travis Green said of his goalie, who was playing because his top two netminders, Linus Ullmark and Anton Forsberg, are injured.

In the final seconds of the middle frame, another Boldy shot hit the crossbar.

“That’s a part of the game, too. One of those, two of those go in, it’s a different game,” Zuccarello said. “But at the end of the day, it’s not good enough when you lose. We battle hard for sure as a team. We do it all, we block shots. We do it all. But they play well I think. We couldn’t get our forecheck going for the majority of time and they did well.”