After falling to the Saskatoon Brewers in the senior championship final for the second straight year, the Moose Jaw Chiefs set out in this offseason to improve and get over the hump in 2018.

The Chiefs return to the court this weekend for a pair of games to kick off the 2018 campaign in the Prairie Gold Lacrosse League.

"The guys are really excited, we've got a new look team this year with some younger guys and we've had really good commitment at practice," said Chiefs veteran Jeff Kitts. "I don't know if the old bodies are ready for back-to-back games the first weekend, but we're really looking forward to getting going."

The Chiefs will head into Regina to face the rival Heat in their season opener on Saturday night and then they will return home on Sunday afternoon to host the Estevan Impact.

The final setback in back-to-back years had the Chiefs looking to get younger going into this season as they look to add more speed to their game.

"We've got some of our Mustang junior guys coming up and a few guys that hadn't played for a few years are joining the squad, so we're quite deep in numbers and it looks good,” said Kitts. “We've got our two goaltenders coming back and a lot of the regular faces that have been a part of the franchise will be back, so we'll still be experienced on the floor."

The Prairie Gold Lacrosse League's senior division grew heading into this season with another Saskatoon team joining the league, as the Plainsmen will be the fourth team in the Bridge City.

Kitts said their expectations remain on a playing for a championship this season.

"The Saskatoon Brewers are a really good squad and we realized that in the final last year, we tried to add some speed to compete with their speed," said Kitts. "I can't see why we wouldn't be in the top-four and our goal is to get back into the final."

With a doubleheader to open the season this weekend, Kitts said that they're just going to keep it simple and try to start the season strong.

"We really want to limit our mistakes, get things clean and understand our systems," he said. "We did some tryouts and added some new guys, so we haven't had a lot of time to work on our special teams and not a lot of time for our systems. This will be a weekend of learning and getting better and fixing the mistakes."

The Chiefs and Heat face-off on Saturday at 7 p.m. and then the Chiefs host the Impact on Sunday at 1:30 p.m. at the Kinsmen Arena.