Matt Wisener has been announced as the winner of the Art Wilkinson Award.

This goes to the Terrier player each season who accumulates the most total points, which Wisener did this year with his 43 point season. The forward says he would've never expected to be the leading scorer at the beginning of this season.

"I had some personal goals coming into the season, but I guess anything can happen. It was my first year of Junior Hockey, and I didn't really have any super high expectations for myself," says Wisener. "I was just doing things to help the team win, that's really all that mattered to me."

The Winnipeg product was tied for fifth in rookie scoring in the entire MJHL and played on the top two lines for the Terriers virtually all season. Wisener says the coaching staff put him in spots to succeed, noting he had the faith of head coach and general manager Blake Spiller.

"I felt like (Spiller) believed in me. He gave me a lot of opportunities that I might not have gotten on other teams," Wisener continues. "He built a team that, basically, went from struggling to win a game, to over .500 in the same season. It was pretty impressive. He's a great coach."

While he really wanted to make the playoffs, Wisener still views the Terriers' season in a positive light. He knows this will motivate the squad even more going into next year.

"I'm not used to being out of the playoffs this early, but we'll be using this for motivation next year," Wisener explains. "There were a lot of positives that came out of this season. We started out the year pretty poorly, and we worked our way up throughout the season, fighting right until the end. Looking at it that way, it was a positive season, and a lot of guys progressed really well throughout the year."

Wisener played most of 2021 alongside the former team captain Logan Calder. The rookie describes what stood out most when playing with the 20-year-old.

"His work ethic. He worked super hard every shift, and he just thought the game well," says Wisener. "He'd go in the right spots, and he could put the puck in the net. That's one thing I want to work on in my game is, maybe scoring a little more. Stuff like that definitely helped me throughout the season and will help me heading into next year too."

Wisener chose to keep his personal goals for next season to himself but notes the one he is putting the most focus on is winning a Centennial Cup for the Portage Terriers.