It's still early in the season, but Friday night's meeting between the Moose Jaw Warriors and Prince Albert Raiders is a big one.

The Warriors enter the game on a three-game winning streak, while the Raiders have won four in a row and are one point ahead of Moose Jaw for top spot in the East Division.

The two teams will meet for the first time on Friday at the Art Hauser Centre.

“We're going to need to work hard,” said forward Jiri Smejkal. “Knowing them, they're going to have a hard fore-check, they've got a pretty good power play, so stay out of the box and just play hard.”

Both the Warriors and Raiders were ranked this week in the CHL Top-10 at sixth and tenth respectively.

While both teams are off to hot starts, it's still October and anything can happen over the next five months.

“Coaches say don't look at the standings, just play the same game,” said Smejkal. “We're playing good right now, but we can't look at the standings or the CHL Top-10, we just need to play simple and stay grounded.”

A lot of the Warriors' success over the past few week has come from the fact that they're able to attack teams with all four lines, allowing their top unit to stay fresh later in games and close teams out.

The Warriors get stronger as the game wears on this year with their goal differential improving from plus-5 in the first period to plus-6 in the second and plus-11 in the third.

“We play all four lines, which is something we didn't do last year, so that's awesome,” said Smejkal.

During Wednesday's 6-1 win over Swift Current, the Warriors were rolling their lines, but head coach Tim Hunter was also mixing and matching the lines to find the best combinations.

Smejkal said they feel like all the players play well together and can fit well together.

“Tim wants to see who will play good with who, we're still trying to find the best match, but it's going pretty good,” he said.

Moose Jaw will look to keep everyone involved on Friday night in Prince Albert as they battle the Raiders.

You can catch all the action live on Country 100 with Western Nissan Warriors Hockey, starting with the Pre-Game Show at 6:40pm.

The Warriors will be in Swift Current to face the Broncos on Saturday night.