Fourth-liner Brendan Lemieux scored twice and Connor Hellebuyck finished with 37 saves as the visiting Winnipeg Jets strengthened their lead atop the Central Division with a 5-1 victory over the Nashville Predators on Thursday.

Bryan Little scored to extend his point streak to seven games, and Brandon Tanev and Mason Appleton also tallied for the Jets, who secured a four-point lead over second-place Nashville.

Winnipeg improved to 6-1-0 in its past seven games.

Viktor Arvidsson scored his 10th goal in as many contests, and Pekka Rinne turned aside 29 shots for Nashville, which fell to 6-2-2 in its past 10 games. The Predators were unsuccessful in their bid to present Peter Laviolette with his 600th coaching victory.

After seeing his bid on breakaway denied by Hellebuyck, Arvidsson cleaned up a rebound of defenseman Ryan Ellis' shot from the slot to trim the Predators' deficit to 2-1 at 11:57 of the second period. Arvidsson's goal, his 18th of the season, tied him with Filip Forsberg for the team lead.

Little batted home a rebound of Patrik Laine's shot from the right circle to regain Winnipeg's two-goal advantage with 46 seconds left in the second period.

Tanev deflected defenseman Sami Niku's shot from the point at 1:54 of the third before Lemieux capped his second two-goal performance of the season with 4:22 remaining.

Lemieux beat Rinne on a wraparound for his fourth goal of the season to open the scoring midway into the first period. The 22-year-old is the son of four-time Stanley Cup champion Claude Lemieux.

Winnipeg nearly doubled the advantage with 2:09 remaining in the first period, as captain Blake Wheeler wired a shot from the right faceoff dot that squeezed inside the near post past a screened Rinne. The apparent tally was negated, however, after Nashville successfully challenged that Mark Scheifele was offside prior to the puck entering the offensive zone.

The Jets seized their 2-0 lead just 3 1/2 minutes into the second, as defenseman Joe Morrow skated deep into the left circle before his cross-slot feed found Appleton on the doorstep for an easy tap-in.

--Field Level Media