We leave for a week and all the sudden teams around here start winning? If we were just a little more superstitious — and we're already plenty superstitious when it comes to sports — we might take it personally, move out of state permanently or both.

As it is, we will simply marvel at the rarity of what is going on. The Wolves have a three-game winning streak. That in and of itself is enough for a parade down First Avenue. The Wild, meanwhile, is undefeated since the All-Star break — a five-game winning streak that has vaulted Minnesota back into playoff contention (from a less than 10 percent chance of making the postseason a couple of weeks ago to more than 40 percent now).

Take a good look at this, Minnesota sports fans. Soak it in like a 75-degree June day. Because these simultaneous winning streaks are rare.

It happened exactly once last season — when the Wolves were as good as they'd been in a decade and the Wild was a playoff team — that both teams were on winning streaks of at least three games at the same time (late February/early March was the time frame).

The Wolves themselves only had nine winning streaks of at least three games between the time KG left and the end of the 2012-13 season (a span of six years).

The Wild had a little more success during that time, and with shootout/OT wins its easier to build a streak. That said, just know that it is exceedingly rare for both teams to get even modestly hot at the same time.

It's not magic, of course — there are explanations beyond the fact that we left the state (after all, we were in Minnesota for three of the Wild's five straight wins as well as Sunday's Wolves win). The Wolves got healthy. The Wild found goaltending stability. The two things everyone was waiting for happened at once.

The depressing part for us is that the Wolves have 11 wins this year, and we're guessing we've seen four of them. They have 40 losses this year, and it feels like we've seen all of them.

But this isn't a time to lament. It's a time to enjoy. Winning feels good, and the sensation is even better when the opposite is such a familiar thing.