Rangers 5, Avalanche 1: Captain Ryan Callahan recorded his 16th career two-goal performance and added an assist as host New York skated to its season-high fourth consecutive victory.

Derick Brassard and Brad Richards each scored and set up a goal and defenseman Anton Stralman netted his first tally of the campaign for the Rangers, who improved to 15-5-1 in their last 21 contests. Carl Hagelin and Mats Zuccarello each notched two assists and Henrik Lundqvist turned aside 27 shots in the win.

Captain Gabriel Landeskog scored a power-play goal and rookie Nathan MacKinnon had an assist to extend their point streaks to seven and a career-high six games, respectively. Semyon Varlamov finished with 38 saves to fall to 12-2-1 in his last 15 starts for the Avalanche, who saw their four-game winning streak come to an end.

Hagelin chipped the puck past pinching Colorado defenseman Jan Hejda to ignite a 2-on-1 rush before feeding Callahan, who backhanded the puck past Varlamov to open the scoring at 14:16 of the first period. The subject of trade rumors, Callahan kept the momentum going 3:19 later by depositing Richards' centering feed past Varlamov for his 11th goal of the season.

The Avalanche trimmed the deficit 6:37 into the second period as MacKinnon's centering feed from the left circle found Landeskog, who wired a shot from the slot past Lundqvist. Stralman answered 53 seconds later as his shot from the point beat Varlamov before Brassard put it out of reach 1:58 into the third after banking a shot off the skate of Ryan O'Reilly and into the net.

GAME NOTEBOOK: Landeskog and MacKinnon have each scored three goals and set up six others during their respective point streaks. ... Zuccarello has two goals and four assists on his four-game point streak. ... Callahan, C Derek Stepan and D Ryan McDonagh will be guests on NBC's "Today Show" on Wednesday morning. ... Alex Kovalev, who won the Stanley Cup with the Rangers in 1994, was in attendance at Madison Square Garden.