The Moose Jaw Warriors threw 38 shots on net on Friday, but came up just short narrowly falling 3-2 to the Brandon Wheat Kings in the first game of a weekend preseason series.

Just in front of the two minute mark of the opening period, Brandon’s Conor Gutenberg led a rush across the Warriors line on the right wing. Gutenberg was able to spot Rylan Bettens in front of the net, Warriors goalie Adam Evanoff made the initial save, but the loose puck trickled over the goal line to give the Wheat Kings an early lead.

With just over seven minutes left in the opening period, the Warriors pressed the Brandon net and 17-year-old defenceman Brendan Kwiatkowski was able to keep the puck in at the blue-line and tossed it back towards the net where 20-year-old Spenser Bast pushed the puck to Justin Almeida between the circles and he rifled in his third of the preseason to tie the game at one.

Both teams had quality opportunities throughout the rest of the period, Brandon out-shot the Warriors 15-6 in the first with a number of those shots coming on back-to-back power plays.

Six minutes into the second, the Wheat Kings' Linden McCorrister was able to come off the Warriors left wall with the puck and then feed Zach Russell on the side of the right crease where he put the Wheat Kings up 2-1.

Moose Jaw picked up a late power play and were able to capitalize. Jaeger White controlled the puck at the right circle and passed it cross ice to the left point for Colin Paradis. The Sherwood Park, Alberta product put a shot along the ice that beat goalie Dylan Myskiw to tie the game at two.

Five minutes into the third period, Gunnar Wegleitner of the Wheat Kings came across the Warriors blue-line and set up Russell inside the left circle where he scored his second of the game to give Brandon the lead.

The Warriors tossed 20 shots on net in the third period, but weren’t able to pick up an equalizer and fell 3-2 in a tight preseason division battle.

These two division rivals will close out their weekend series and the 2017 WHL Preseason on Saturday at Mosaic Place. You can catch all the action on Country 100 as Warriors Hockey returns to the radio starting with the Pre-Game Show at 6:55 p.m. with James Gallo, Derek Kletzel, and Marc Smith.