The Home Hardware Midget AAA Legionnaires held their 2018 fall camp over the weekend at the Innovation Credit Union iPlex in Swift Current.

Nearly 70 players were split over four camp rosters, vying for a spot on the resurgent squad.

The Legionnaires are coming off their best season in recent memory by a large margin.

They worked a 26-13-1-4 record in the 2017-18 regular season, fifth-best in the SMAAAHL, before downing the Tisdale Trojans in four games to reach the league semis. There. the Legionnaires fell to the eventual national-champion Notre Dame Hounds in three games.

In turn, the quality of the on-ice product on the camp rosters reflected a team that's trending upwards.

"Our organization has gotten better the last two years, and we feel this has been our best fall camp for depth," said Legionnaires head coach Darren Evjen. "We have some hard decisions to make, and that's good. If you don't have hard decisions to make, that's not good. We just feel there's lots of players who could come in here, and throughout the exhibition season, end up staying here."

After Evjen commended last season's returning veterans on their ability to buy in and come to 2017 fall camp prepared, it appears that 2018 is no different for this year's leadership group.

"Well we did our fitness testing on Friday, and our guys put in the work. They want to get better, and it just seems that everybody has bought in and they want to make this team better. They showed that with their fitness, the maturity, and those kinds of things."

The Legionnaires will be without their top five scorers from last season, as Hunter Lamb, Jacob Piller, Owen Ozar, Rin Beny, and Ty Muench all graduated.

Stepping up will be a host of talent including forwards Mason Strutt, Jerzy Orchard, and Reed Jacobson, along with defencemen Lucas Ochitwa, Kersey Reich, and Mac Gross.

"The biggest thing now is they are the guys and they have to step up, so it is a different feel for them," said Evjen of the transition from youth to vets in the SMAAHL. "We've had two really good groups of leadership in here the past two years, so they know the expectation to have success in this league."

"I would support and trust that my guys are ready to do that, and they're up to the challenge to try and lead this team to as good as it can be," he added.

Evjen and the coaching staff will be trimming the roster down to roughly 28 players in time for the start of their preseason schedule.

Several players have already been signed for the upcoming season, though the full roster will be announced upon the completion of the Legionnaires' five-game preseason campaign.

"The first three games, like I said to the guys at the meeting when we started, you're going to have to make the weekend, because there's going to be lots of people released," Evjen noted. "We're going to get down in numbers more so than we have in the past. From there, once we get going in the exhibition it's game-by-game. If players don't have a good game, it's probably not a good situation for them. They have to be ready to go, because we've got to make decisions in a short period of time."

The Legionnaires open the preseason September 6 on the road against the Moose Jaw Generals, and close September 16 at home against the Saskatoon Contacts.

The regular-season opener is set for September 22 on the road against the Beardys Blackhawks.