It has been a tale of two seasons.

At the start of the year, the story was Cristiano Ronaldo and his 70-goal pace. And now, a month and half into 2015, the script has flipped and favored his rival Lionel Messi. It has been a woeful 2015 for the reigning Ballon d'Or winner, who has in recent weeks watched his great rival make up ground in the race for the leading scorer in the world. Did Messi complete the turnaround?

Heading into the week, Messi was three goals behind his great rival for the most overall goals in all competitions. Messi, whose Barcelona is still battling for the Copa del Rey, had two games to make his case, and he certainly performed up to par in the first game of the week against Villarreal. He put up a goal and assist in that match as Barcelona continued its tremendous winning streak.

Ronaldo had a chance to answer on Saturday in a game against Deportivo La Coruna at the Santiago Bernabeu. Earlier this year, Real Madrid torched Deportivo 8-2 on the road, with Ronaldo providing a hat trick. Ronaldo's controversial birthday party was the central story heading into the match, as many were upset that the struggling superstar opted to party after his team was blown out 4-0 last week.

Ronaldo could have made everyone forget with a great effort, but instead he faltered at every turn, hitting the post on one chance and ultimately extending his scoring drought to three games for the first time this season and the first time in a few years. He did notch an assist on the 2-0 game, but this is far from vintage Ronaldo.

With Ronaldo stuck on 36 goals in all competition all year long, Messi took advantage of his chance to catch and surpass Ronaldo with a hat trick and an assist in Barcelona's 5-0 win over Levante.

Season and Calendar Year Stats

Remember when everyone was talking about Ronaldo blowing Messi's 50-goal 2011-12 season out of the water with his 70-goal pace?

How about we look at the fact that Ronaldo now has fewer goals than Messi in all competitions? Both players have contested 33 games this year, and now Messi leads the race with 37 goals and 18 assists; Ronaldo has 36 and 14. Moreover, Ronaldo has 26 goals from open play while Messi has 34; 10 of Ronaldo's goals have come from the penalty spot, while only three of Messi have been spot kicks. And to add insult to injury, Messi now has five hat tricks on the year, passing Ronaldo in this department, as well.

On the year, Messi is making Ronaldo look ordinary as well, though part of that is Ronaldo's own futility in recent months. Messi has a whopping 14 goals and nine assists in 11 matches, while his rival is barely cutting a 0.5 goals per game pace with four goals and two assists in eight matches.

The only thing Ronaldo can console himself with at this point is knowing he still has a two-goal lead on his rival in the domestic competition, but even there he is buoyed by having eight penatlies while Messi has only had two.

Streaking

Since the back-to-back losses against Real Madrid and Celta Vigo, Messi has not gone more than a game without a goal and has put up a total of 28 goals in 19 games, including five hat tricks. That is a pace of 1.47 goals per game.

Since Real Madrid's 3-1 win over Barcelona on Oct. 25, 2014, Ronaldo has 16 goals in 16 games. Prior to then, he had 19 goals in 14 games, a pace of 1.35 goals per game, making it clear that Messi is currently scoring at a pace better than Ronaldo was scoring at in his finest form this year.

Winner

No one, not even Real Madrid fans or the most fervent Ronaldo supporters, could find a defense for their superstar in this week's contest. Messi scored four goals and provided two assists in two games. Ronaldo had one assist and continued to look like a player in decline in his most recent contest. Now Messi has a 10-9 lead on the competition, something that seemed improbable when Ronaldo had a 7-2 lead in this competition in mid-November.

For last week's installment of this weekly feature, click here.

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