The opening week of the WHL Preseason went into the books on Saturday for the Moose Jaw Warriors, who went 2-1 in their first three games of the exhibition schedule.

Moose Jaw finished things off with a 4-1 win over the Regina Pats on Saturday night at the Brandt Centre, winning their second straight.

The Warriors dressed a more veteran lineup in the game than they had in the previous two preseason games with the majority of their returning players from 2016-17 playing in the game.

“It was fun to get back on the ice with the guys,” said Captain Brett Howden, who was playing in his first preseason game of the year.

“I thought we played pretty good, obviously there’s still tons of stuff to work on, we’re still trying to get a feel for this year’s team, but a lot of it is similar to last year, so that’s a good thing for us.”

Howden, Jayden Halbgewachs, Noah Gregor and Luka Burzan had a goal and two points each in the win for the Warriors.

While the returning players did the scoring, Head Coach Tim Hunter came away impressed with the performances of the younger players that were in the lineup for the Warriors.

“We were looking for certain things from the younger guys and that’s the most important part, the two young goalies, Drae Gardiner, Brayden Tracey, those guys are the guys that we really have our eye one,” said Hunter. “It was really exciting (Oleg) Sosunov and what kind of player he’s going to be in this league.”

Sosunov drew a lot of attention throughout the game, which was his first actual game action with the Warriors. The six-foot-eight defenceman had a few Pats attempt to hit him, only to end up on the ice, and he delivered a crushing blow along the boards to Regina star forward Sam Steel during the second period.

Howden, who spent time as centre on his usual line with Halbgewachs and Tanner Jeannot, said it was good to get the returning players on the ice together to start rebuilding their chemistry.

“That’s something that you can always work on, a lot of it is off-ice stuff too and then that carries to on-ice,” he said. “A lot of it is going to carry over from last year because there’s a lot of returning players, a lot of vets, so things are looking really good and we’re really excited for this year.”

Howden, Halbgewachs, Jeannot, Gregor, Sosunov, Josh Brook and Dmitri Zaitsev will all be leaving Warrior camp this week to attend their respective NHL camps. (Check DiscoverMooseJaw.com later this week for more on that.)

Hunter said he wanted to get those players on the ice together once before they left.

“It’s our only opportunity to play them all together until the regular season, if they all come back from NHL camps, so we gave all the guys going to NHL camps an opportunity to play, develop a little chemistry and get in that mode because they’re all going to be playing in rookie tournaments starting next week,” said Hunter.

“Over the next two weeks when we play Medicine Hat and Brandon, we’ll have a much different team and a much younger team.”

The Warriors have just one game this week when they host the Tigers at Mosaic Place on Saturday.