Describing it as a victory for "men's footy", Garry Hocking now has a standard to hold up for his young Magpies.

After two vapid efforts against Norwood and Woodville-West Torrens, Port Adelaide's SANFL side hit back with an imperfect performance against Sturt at Alberton on Saturday.

Imperfect, for the Magpies conceded ten goals in two quarters of football.

That's something Port Adelaide will need to work on, with the Magpies also struggling to implement its best ball use at times as well.

But the positives outweighed the negatives on Saturday, the Magpies having toughed-out a strong and firing Sturt to jump back into the top five.

Part of that hard-edged effort included keeping the Double Blues scoreless during the second term, and finding key goal kickers late in the final quarter to take an eight-point win.

"I'm really happy for our fans, for our supporters, we haven't lost three in a row for the last couple of years, so that's been key for us, to make sure we bounce back," Hocking said after the game.

"We've played all of the top five from last year, we're three-and-two, so ahead of the ledger, so that's pleasing.

"But still some work to do."

That work entails plugging the goal flow of Port Adelaide's opposition, and Hocking wants to see a well-rounded defensive effort against the Crows in Balaklava next Sunday.

"11.1 [Sturt's score] isn't good enough ... defensively we still not to ramp it up," Hocking said.

"At the end of the day conversion probably didn't help us... they kicked at 92 per cent, we were at about 40.

"We've got to make sure that once we do all that hard work that we get inside-50 and we put pressure back on the scoreboard."

Hocking is hoping the performance shown on Saturday gives the Port faithful a glimpse into the type of footy expected of the Magpies this season.

"Sturt are really good, they've improved on last year, moved the ball really well at times ... sometimes you can't defend that," Hocking said.

"I thought it was just a really good, exciting game of footy.

"There's still work to do, I'm not happy with some of the defensive stuff - team defence - but I reckon our supporters could see there was more effort, and more care this week.

"Hopefully our fans can walk away and see that's the level we need to play to."

Port Adelaide next plays the Adelaide Crows at Ralli Oval, Balaklava on Sunday 17 May at 1:10pm