The Steinbach Pistons scored three goals in the opening period, and goalie Easton Thvedt made 22 saves for the shutout, as the Pistons claimed a 3-0 win on Sunday night. Offensive might Early in the game, both teams were a little reckless, taking some penalties which were not successful, and it lead to having the game take a little time to ramp up. In the second half of the first period, Marek Miller opened the scoring, showing off his elite hands and patience, as he waited out the Flyers netminder before flipping home a backhander to make it 1-0 Steinbach. Evan Gradt and Brody Green picked up the assists. A few minutes later, Ben O'Leary stormed into the offensive zone and wired a beautiful shot past the goalies glove side, notching his second of the preseason, and extending the lead to 2-0. Eric Han and Evan Kabel were given credit for the assists. Less than a minute later, Zhenya Miles fed a beautiful pass to the slot for the waiting Hunter Kelso, who made no mistake, wiring home his first of the exhibition schedule, putting the Pistons up 3-0. Thvedt was solid throughout the period, finishing the frame making all 7 stops he was required to make. Defensive second The middle frame saw the Flyers come out stronger, faster and more determined, but the Steinbach defenders answered the bell, using their size, positioning and smarts to keep most Winkler rushes to the outside. When the visitors did manage shots, Thvedt was there to make the 11 saves he was called upon to make. 3-0 remained the score after forty minutes. Tempers boil over There was a fair amount of pushing and shoving, some hard hits and late in the second, things boiled over as Peyton Thiessen of Steinbach dropped the gloves with Flyers defender. It was a quick tussle, and both players were shown the gate. Closing time In the third, the Pistons played a hard, mature, solid style of hockey, never letting the Flyers get chances or build momentum. Time melted away and as the horn sounded, the 3-0 Steinbach built in the first held as just that, giving them their second straight preseason win over Winkler. Thvedt was perfect, earning a 22 save shutout. Coaches notes A point that stood out to Head Coach Paul Dyck was that this game felt more in control than Friday's. "Yeah, it did," the bench boss said with a grin from the hallway of the Southeast Event Centre. "I think, obviously the big start helped us, coming out and, I'm not sure what span we scored those three goals, but it gave the guys a lot of confidence. It didn't feel like we were on our heels much of the time, but I thought we could have managed the puck a bit better. There were spurts where we slowed it down, and I think our players found out that when you do that, it's very difficult to pick up and get to the pace you want to play at. Overall, I mean, second exhibition game, we're learning as we go, and it was fun to see the guys make adjustments, understanding when they did make some mistakes that could of hurt us. I thought our goalie played extremely well, too." Getting Thvedt the whole game was important for him, as he really found a groove early and he never came out of it. "It's the same as we've seen in practice since he's arrived here in Steinbach. He's sharp, he reads the play and does a great job finding pucks. I thought he was in control of his game all night, played the puck really well, and good for him. We always say these games don't mean anything, but they do. They mean something for the players, mean something for the dressing room afterward, and mean something for the culture that we can resume building this year." Steinbach was more structured this year and Dyck says the defense core overall were very solid and did a lot of the little things right. "I thought our sticks were really good," the coach details. "Broke up a lot, guys were coming back through the middle of the ice, and taking away lanes. They were not tentative by any means, they were fairly aggressive with how we defended, and it's always the five guys on the ice, the forwards did a great job helping out the backend. Not a bad start." With a few days before the preseason schedule resumes, Dyck outlines what they'll be doing with the time. "We'll connect some lines, we've done that already. We saw DeGagne's line stick together Friday and tonight. In practice, we've started to do stuff like that. Our focus still is doing evaluations on what we have. We're going to cut down a little bit here today. We'll figure out who's healthy and who can move forward." Up next Steinbach will head to Niverville on Friday for their third of four preseason games.