Patrik Laine Can't Stop, Won't Stop

Winnipeg Jets super rookie Patrik Laine prefers to score in threes.

After recording three goals in a game for the third time this season (and second against the Stars) on Tuesday, Laine has completed a feat that most don't accomplish in their entire career—the hat trick of hat tricks. The first-year Fin is also the first player in NHL history to register three hat tricks before his 19th birthday, according to Elias.

With goal No. 24, 25 and 26 of the season against Dallas on Tuesday, Laine completed his third three-goal effort of the campaign with over seven weeks still remaining in the regular season, while his big night snapped a five-game goalless drought and moved the 18-year-old within one tally of Maple Leafs rookie Auston Matthews (27) and one point back of Matthews' teammate Mitch Marner (48) for the rookie leads in goals and points, respectively.

Laine is the first NHL rookie with three hat tricks in a season since Teemu Selanne and Eric Lindros in 1992-93. Selanne, a Jets legend himself, achieved that feat while playing in Winnipeg during his own rookie campaign—one where he put up an absurd 76 goals and 132 points, a pair of rookie records that still stand today.

To put into perspective how insane Laine's feat is, the rookie is one of only 56 active NHL players to have recorded at least three hat tricks during his career. He joins a list that includes David Krejci, Anze Kopitar, Jonathan Toews, Vladimir Tarasenko and Johnny Gaudreau while sitting one back of names like Patrick Sharp, Joe Thornton, Joe Pavelski and Taylor Hall—who have all turned in four tricks throughout their prestigious careers.

Laine has done it through only 51 career games, an absolutely astounding number when you consider Toews (693), Kopitar (813) and Krejci (681) have all played at least 600 more games than the Jets' rookie.

Meanwhile, Laine and Matthews continue to battle it out in the rookie goal-scoring race. To counter Laine's third hat trick of the season, Matthews responded with two goals of his own in a 7-1 Maple Leafs win over the Islanders on Tuesday. Matthews and Laine are the first draft picks taken No. 1 and No. 2 overall in the same year to each score 25 goals in their rookie season since the 2004 draft, when top-two picks Alex Ovechkin and Evgeni Malkin each did it during their freshman campaigns, according to Sportsnet.

Laine also leads all rookies with five multi-goal games, leads all qualified freshmen with 0.92 points per game, and is tied with Sidney Crosby (2005-06) and Nathan MacKinnon (2013-14) for most game-winning goals (five) in a season by an 18-year-old.

As mid-winter temperatures hover around near-hypothermic ranges in Winnipeg, Laine is just trying to keep it hot—one hatty at a time.

[FOX]