WINNIPEG, Manitoba -- Patrik Laine knew Nikolaj Ehlers was about to break out of his slump, but it wasn't from anything the young Dane had been doing on the ice.

The rookie Laine shrugged when asked about his linemate scoring a pair of goals -- his sixth and seventh of the season -- to lead the Jets to a 4-1 victory over the Colorado Avalanche on Sunday afternoon because he had been witness to a leading indicator. Ehlers was finally lighting the lamp in PlayStation's NHL 2017 video game following a drought there, too.

"He has scored in PlayStation lately," the 18-year-old Laine said about the 20-year-old Ehlers. "I knew this day would come. It was huge for him to get those goals."

Ehlers' goals were actually the insurance markers at 4:03 and 19:30 of the third period, but that didn't make him any less happy. His first goal, a laser of a wrist shot that beat Calvin Pickard, who was playing his first game in his hometown, high to the glove side and came just 69 seconds after captain Blake Wheeler had given the Jets a 2-0 lead. Laine had the Jets other goal -- his 18th of the season -- while Colorado's Jarome Iginla spoiled Connor Hellebuyck's shutout bid with his fourth goal of the year with just 2:01 to go in regulation.

Hellebuyck stopped 29 of 30 shots to post the win while Pickard got in front of 26 of the 30 shots the Jets fired his way.

"It was pretty sweet," said Ehlers, who broke a 15-game scoring drought last week in a losing effort against the Calgary Flames.

He has been getting off plenty of shots all season long and is one of the league leaders in assists with 19 but he's not overly concerned about not bulging the twine himself.

"All you care about is how the team is doing and the personal (stats) come second," Ehlers said. "It's not that I've been feeling that I haven't played well. I've been feeling really good and playing with a lot of confidence."

In many ways, the Jets hope the reemergence of the goal-scoring Ehlers will provide a spark similar to what center Bryan Little's return from a lengthy injury did a couple of weeks ago.

"Ehlers is a guy who, when it rains it pours," said Wheeler. "He creates a lot of opportunities. It was nice to see him get a good look at the goalie and put it where he wanted to."

Ehlers had 15 goals and 38 points last season.

The win boosted the Jets record to 15-16-3 while the Avalanche fell to 11-18-1. The Avalanche have lost 10 of their last 12 games.

Laine, who continues to lead all rookies in scoring and sits third overall behind Pittsburgh's Sidney Crosby (21) and Boston's David Pastrnak (19), scored the game's opening goal at 7:06 of the second period after defenseman Paul Postma spotted him and Mark Scheifele sneaking in behind the Avs defenders.

As they bore in on Pickard, Laine turned sideways, cocked his stick and waited for a saucer pass from his center to one-time.

"I knew he was going to pass so I had to be ready," Laine said. "He's a really good passer. He got the pass to me and it was easy to score."

Colorado coach Jared Bednar didn't like much of what he saw, in particular the odd-man rushes that led to the goals by Laine and Wheeler.

"We gave up some good chances and (Pickard) was real good in goal in the first half of the game," he said. "Then the shots were down and we weren't generating that much offensively so there wasn't a whole bunch to like offensively.

"The start of the third period, we had a couple of offensive blue line turnovers that ended up in the back of our net. They got us with speed, sneaking in behind us and attacking us on the rush there. We didn't handle that well tonight."

Iginla, who became the 16th player in NHL history to play 1,500 games earlier this month, said the power-play unit had nothing to lose when Jets winger Chris Thorburn was sent off for closing his hand on the puck with 3:12 left in the game.

"At that point, we're just trying to give it a chance. With a couple minutes left, you never know. You don't want to be down three. We were right there with them but the third period they went bang, bang and you've got to give them credit. They deserved that game by the way they played in the third period," he said.

NOTES: Scratched for the Avalanche were G Semyon Varlamov, C Joe Colborne and D Cody Goloubef. ... Joining them from the Jets were D Mark Stuart and C Alexander Burmistrov. ... Colorado C Nate MacKinnon has arguably the highest profile among players from either team thanks to a series of Tim Hortons television commercials he has done with Pittsburgh superstar Sidney Crosby. ... Winnipeg C Bryan Little leads his team with a 56 percent rate in the face-off circle (98-for-175). ... Jets winger Shawn Matthias scored six goals in 20 games for the Avalanche last season.