Maybe all that trade talk has given the Colorado Avalanche forwards a little more jump?

Whatever the inspiration, the struggling club has found some offensive life as of late, their past two games serving as their best offensive efforts in a long, long time.

After posting a surprising 5-2 win over the Winnipeg Jets on Saturday, Colorado opened their tilt with the Montreal Canadiens - leaders of the Atlantic Division - with two goals in the opening three minutes. The Avs added two more over the remaining two periods to finish with four total and a shutout victory.

Colorado's performance over the past two games represents a significant step forward for the club. Prior to their win over the Jets, the Avalanche had scored more than two goals in a game just twice in their past 20 games - once in December and once in January.

Mikko Rantanen - the youngest member of the Avalanche - kicked things off with a goal just 30 seconds into Colorado's tilt against the Canadiens, beating Carey Price with a deceptive point shot.

Rantanen added goals in each of the next two periods to earn his first career hat trick - just another fantastic sign for the young Finn, who's quickly becoming the team's most dangerous weapon.

The 20-year-old now has five goals in his past five games. With his hat trick in tow, Rantanen passed captain Gabriel Landeskog in the team goal-scoring race, having scored 11 in total. He now sits third in that race - just one goal back of Nathan MacKinnon, and in five fewer games.

It's been a rough season for the Avalanche's offense, but having their youngest stars becoming their most effective is undoubtedly a promising sign in terms of the club's future progress.

Don't count out the rest of the core just yet though.

Matt Duchene - who's seen his name embroiled in plenty of trade talks recently - tallied a team-leading three points in the Avalanche's win over Winnipeg, while MacKinnon and Landeskog combined for four points against the Canadiens.

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Hours after Claude Julien - the longest-tenured head coach in the NHL until Tuesday morning - was fired by the Boston Bruins, another bench boss of an Original Six team recorded a milestone win.

While it wasn't pretty, Alain Vigneault won his 600th regular-season game after the New York Rangers beat the Anaheim Ducks 4-1, despite being outshot 44-20.

Related: Rangers continue troubling trend in win over Ducks

Vigneault becomes only the 15th coach to reach the 600-win milestone, according to the NHL, after coaching the Montreal Canadiens for four years, the Vancouver Canucks for seven, and the Rangers for four.

Vigneault won a Jack Adams Award as coach of the year in 2007, with the Canucks. He's come close to winning the Stanley Cup twice, his Canucks losing the final in seven games to the Boston Bruins in 2011 - to Julien, interestingly enough - and his Rangers losing the 2014 final to the Los Angeles Kings in five games.

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A British Columbia farmer decided to take matters into his own hands by getting behind the wheel of his personal Zamboni.

Marko Kardum used the Zamboni - purchased second-hand for $300 - to try and clear a city street to help his aunt get out of her driveway, and was subsequently pulled over by local authorities.

"We had that heavy snow (Monday) night so we wanted to see if the Zamboni would do a better job. So we took it out and we got it up to my aunt’s house and back and that’s when we got pulled over," Kardum told The Times Colonist.

Sgt. Paul Brailey deemed Kardum's intentions to be good and not reckless, but while the Zamboni was able to clear a top layer of snow, it flattened the bottom layer which could have hardened into a dangerously icy surface if the temperature dropped.

Lesson learned, as Kardum plans to keep the Zamboni on his farm from now on.

- With h/t Puck Daddy

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There's a reason Mikko Rantanen is one of the few untouchables on the Colorado Avalanche.

Rantanen, the 10th overall pick in 2015, netted the first hat trick of his career Tuesday, converting his third goal of the night on a one-timer past Carey Price.

Colorado's prized rookie now has 11 goals and 24 points on the season.

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It wasn't going to be hard to do better than Jhonas Enroth, but so far so very good for Toronto Maple Leafs backup goalie Curtis McElhinney.

Enroth and his ghastly .872 save percentage was traded to the Anaheim Ducks on Jan. 11, one day after Toronto added McElhinney on waivers from the Columbus Blue Jackets. And in four games, McElhinney's been excellent.

The 33-year-old started his third game for Toronto on Tuesday, and stopped a whopping 39-of-40 shots the Dallas Stars fired his way in a 3-1 Maple Leafs victory.

McElhinney's at .935 and has a 2-2 record and 2.11 goals against average in blue and white.

As you can see, when McElhinney's been in net, he's been put to work by his new team. And Toronto's going to need him, as the club has a busy schedule the rest of the way, including back-to-back games on Feb. 14 and 15 and Feb. 18 and 19.

With Frederik Andersen struggling since 2017 began, McElhinney may prove to be one of the best pickups of the season by any team should his solid play continue.

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An optimist might refer to the New York Rangers' season as efficient. A pessimist, however, might consider it unsustainable.

The Blueshirts downed the Anaheim Ducks 4-1 on Tuesday, but the shot count was hardly as convincing as the final score. New York was outshot 44-20, yet escaped with a win, marking the league-leading 20th time - out of 34 wins - they've come away with a victory when beaten on the shot clock.

So, how do they make it work?

The Rangers are tied with the Washington Capitals for the NHL's second most goals for - 179 through 53 games. Per Corsica-Hockey, New York's team shooting percentage of 9.49 percent ranks third league-wide, led by Michael Grabner, the club's top goal scorer (25) and his 20.8 percent conversion clip.

Meeting the expected narrative, Grabner scored twice Tuesday.

Beyond timely scoring, the only way to win when allowing that many attempts is exceptional goaltending.

Enter The King.

In his last eight starts, Henrik Lundqvist has earned six wins, posting a .941 save percentage with a 1.88 goals-against average and one shutout. He's had peaks and valleys this season, and even with a huge workload, Lundqvist remains New York's best hope to win night in and night out.

The Rangers are comfortably slotted in the first wild-card seed with 69 points, so it's working, the question is just how long it can last.

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Minnesota's offense is running wild.

With a pair of goals against Winnipeg on Tuesday, Jason Pominville became the tenth Wild player to hit a double-digit goal total this season. Only the high-powered Washington Capitals can boast such offensive depth so far this year.

Minnesota a top-four team in terms of goals scored this season, and yet don't have one player who's running away with the lead.

• 17: Nino Niederreiter
• 16: Jason Zucker, Mikko Koivu, Eric Staal
• 15: Mikael Granlund
• 13: Charlie Coyle
• 11: Chris Stewart
• 10: Erik Haula, Zach Parise, Jason Pominville

As a result of these contributions and single-digit goal totals recorded by others on the roster, Minnesota is on pace to set a new single-season goals record, and by a wide margin.

By averaging 3.35 goals per game in Bruce Boudreau's first season behind the bench, Minnesota is on pace for approximately 275 in 82 games.

Here's a look at the next three most potent Wild seasons:

That Minnesota is one of the NHL's best teams in terms of fewest goals allowed bodes well for success when it matter most: the Stanley Cup Playoffs.

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Jake Allen might finally be finding his game.

It's a small sample size, but the St. Louis Blues goaltender has strung together a few solid starts under new head coach Mike Yeo, and thanks to the tutelage of NHL legend Martin Brodeur and fellow goalie coach Ty Conklin.

Add it all up and Allen has a 2-1-0 record and a .954 save percentage in three starts since the coaching change in St. Louis.

On top of that, Carter Hutton recorded a shutout Sunday over Philadelphia, and Yeo is benefiting from the kind of goaltending that eluded the Blues earlier this season under the recently fired Ken Hitchcock.

For the season, Allen is back to an even save percentage of .900, and the Blues are certainly hoping he can creep back up to his career average of .910 down the stretch.

Their playoff hopes depend on it.

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Fair to assume this was a bittersweet victory for Evander Kane, to say the least.

The Buffalo Sabres sniper came up with one of his finest performances of the season Tuesday night, scoring the overtime winner - his second goal of the game - to cap a wild late-game comeback over the San Jose Sharks.

Kane was tripped up by netminder Martin Jones during the one-time goal, launching him headfirst into the boards as his teammates celebrated. He was able to get to his feet and leave the ice without assistance.

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It was milestone night in Tampa Bay on Tuesday, as the Lightning served up a 5-0 shellacking to the Los Angeles Kings.

Goaltender Ben Bishop earned his first shutout of the season, turning aside 28 shots to clinch the goose egg. This season's shutout leader, Peter Budaj, had far less success, stopping just 16 of 21 while getting tagged with a few highlight reel goals.

Tampa Bay's forwards reached a few key season plateaus as well.

Nikita Kucherov tallied his 20th goal of the season on as clear-cut a breakaway chance as one can earn, capitalizing on a well-placed stretch pass from Vladislav Namestnikov. Late in the second, Namestnikov and Kucherov linked up for another impressive tally, giving the latter Russian a team-leading 21 goals this year.

Sandwiched in between Kucherov's two goals was Gabriel Dumont's first goal of the season - and first as a member of the Lightning. Dumont's quick shot earned him his first goal since the 2012-13 season - when he scored his only previous big-league tally as a member of the Montreal Canadiens.

Tampa Bay defender Braydon Coburn got in on the offensive frenzy in the latter half of the third period, potting the fifth and final goal of the game. In so doing, he earned his second goal of the year, marking the rearguard's first multi-goal season since 2013-14.

After winning just three of their past 10 games, the Lightning have now earned victories in two straight, doing so for the first time since late December.

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