The Portage Terriers are back on the ice tonight when they travel to Steinbach to take on the Pistons in Manitoba Junior Hockey League action. The Terriers are currently sitting in first place in the league while the Pistons are right behind them only one point back. Steinbach has had the Terriers' number early in the young season as they have beat Portage both times they clashed by a combined score of 10-4. Terrier Reilly Funk has been on a hot streak as of late and was recently named the MJHL Player of the Week.

Funk says part of the challenge will be taking on the Pistons hot goaltending along with their top two scoring lines.

"Their goaltending's been really good as of late," says Funk. "They've got one or two good lines with some firepower. If we can shut that down and play in their end the whole game then we'll be set."

Assistant Coach Paul Harland says the biggest focus will be on speed along with a tight defensive effort in their own end.

"We need to keep working on our defensive zone coverage," says Harland. "Making sure that we're playing fast through the neutral zone. Our forecheck has been pretty good on most nights but we're going to continue to work on that. Making sure we're ready to go and focused. We have to do a few little adjustments to what they do in their rink, we'll prepare our guys for that and hopefully we can go in and have a real solid effort."

Tale of the Tape

Record
Portage Terriers 10-3-0
Steinbach Pistons 9-4-1

Special Teams
The Terriers' powerplay is the toast of the league right now sitting in first place overall with a mark of 29.4%. Their penalty kill on the other hand sits down near the bottom of the league. They are ninth overall with a man in the box, with PK rating of 76.3%. Steinbach has the fifth-ranked powerplay, operating at 21.3% efficiency. Their penalty kill is second overall with an 87.2% rating.

Team Leaders
Terriers - Reilly Funk 7G 9A 16Pts.
Pistons - Brady Tatro 9G 11A 20 Pts.

Goaltenders
Terriers - Miles Minor .890 save percentage and 3.28 GAA.
Pistons - Matthew Radomsky .929 save percentage and 1.91 GAA.

It will be a tough matchup with the Pistons for Portage tonight as Steinbach not only has the highest scorer in the league in Tatro, they also have one of the best netminders in Radomsky. The Terriers are fully capable of winning and have a good chance at securing their lead atop the standings. They will however have to outwork their opponents' special teams. Portage did that against Virden on the weekend, going 3/4 on the PK and 2/3 with the man advantage. It should be a great matchup as the Pistons are the only team that has defeated the Terriers more than once this season and is one of only two teams to have taken two points off the Dogs all season.

Puck drop is set for 7:30 pm.  You can catch all the action on CFRY, starting with the pre-game show at 7:20 pm.