The Portage Terriers wrapped up their home pre-season schedule with a match against the Neepawa Natives at Stride Place.

It was a scoreless first period as the Terriers penalty kill came out twice and managed to curb Neepawa’s powerplay attempts. Shots on goal in the first were 6-4 in favour of the Natives.

The second period was a high-intensity battle between the Terriers and the Natives. Both teams mustered up some chances but were stopped by dominant goaltending to keep the score at 0. The Terriers led the shots on goal 14-12

The Terriers got on the board twice in the third period. 1999 born Riley Bruce was the first Terrier player to score. Tyler Lees and Logan Calder set up the passing play in front of the net before Bruce managed to drive it in.

The Terriers continued the scoring in the dying seconds of the third. Sheldin Howard scored the empty-net goal to carry the Terriers to a 2-0 victory.

Assistant Coach Paul Harland gives his thoughts on the game.

"It's just exhibition, we mixed in a few veterans," says Harland. "We still have a lot of young guys and we thought the game was sloppy to start. There wasn't a lot going on from either side. I thought our second period was a little bit better and fortunately for us, we got a nice goal late in the game and an empty netter."

Goaltending was the highlight of the game. Terriers goalie Cole Johnston earned the shutout stopping all 26 shots. On the other side, Natives netminder, Dawson Green stopped 20 shots.

Harland talks about Johnston's performance.

"It was a big game for him. He's trying to make our club and he had a really good showing tonight, I thought he played very well," says Harland. "I thought his rebound control was really good and he made some key saves and looked comfortable in the net. It's a little bit of a dark horse race to see who's going to stick with us in goaltending. He showed well."

The Portage Terriers are now 2-0 in the pre-season. They travel to Virden to take on the Oil Caps on September 10th, before wrapping the pre-season up on the 14th against Neepawa.