This year's All Nations Tribal Days is being deemed a success by organizers.

The annual event is organized by Long Plain, Dakota Plains, and Sandy Bay First Nations, and features a hockey tournament, and several activities taking place over the weekend. Long Plain Chief Dennis Meeches notes while the hockey tournament is often the biggest draw, he heard positive feedback on all events that took place over the weekend.

"It's really important just to have the festival itself, the Tribal Days brings people from all over to a city such as Portage la Prairie. Having the team sports, individual events, it's good. The atmosphere was great, everyone was anticipating the coming of the weekend, there was a lot of good reports on it from people. They enjoyed all the events, so yeah, it was a good weekend."

While three communities are behind the annual event at this point, Meeches says the ongoing success could lead to growth in the future.

"I feel very good about it, with the three bands being involved. That may grow down the road, we may invite other First Nations to participate. It's a big event and a growing event, so we have a lot of different things happening during the weekend and it looks promising for the weekend."

Meeches says while the final day of the three-day event saw some challenges, as a blizzard passed through the region, it didn't dampen the spirits of those at the event.

"Although we had a bit of a blizzard there yesterday, it still turned out pretty good. We had great attendance, and we like to see Portage la Prairie citizens involved, we've seen a lot of citizens come out and participate, so it is great, overall."

As for the hockey tournament, Meeches notes they saw Eagle Lake go up against Peguis, and Peguis took the championship in the Neechie Division.