Records are meant to be broken, and, for the 2019-20 Diamond Energy Female Midget AAA Wildcats' roster, an organizational benchmark set a decade ago can now be considered as such.

The 2009-10 season saw seven graduating players go on to play post-secondary hockey - a mark that stood as the highest until this year.

The program's new benchmark saw a total of nine Wildcats either sign or verbally commit between late September and early March this season. Eight are graduating players, with the ninth still set to return for her grade 12 campaign in the fall.

 "We're extremely proud of what all those kids accomplished. Make no mistake, it's those kids that earned those opportunities," said Wildcats head coach Terry Pavely. "We helped them along the way, but we're very proud of all those kids that worked hard and earned an opportunity to continue playing hockey next year."

"I give kudos to our kids, because a lot of our kids were kind of under the radar," said Pavely on the resiliency the graduating class showed. "They came back as grade 12s and allowed the process to take care of itself, allowed us to coach them, kind of stick to the plan that we had, and they worked really hard, and they earned these opportunities."

"That's important for a lot of kids to see - yeah, some of the kids do get offers in grade 10 and 11, but if you work hard, you're a good kid, you stick to the process, play within a system and help your team win, you're going to get opportunities," he added.

Starting in the 2006-07 season, the Wildcats have had a total 64 prospects sign or verbally commit to play post-secondary hockey at various colleges and universities across Canada, as well as south of the border.

Moving players on to the post-secondary level is not just a point of pride for the Wildcats, it's the main goal of it - making this a rewarding record to see topped.

"We're competitive and we want to win, but the reality of our program - number one is we want kids that get opportunities to play hockey after they graduate from high school," he noted. "When you have success like we did this year, kids get opportunities."

This year's number of signed players had the very real potential to be even higher, but one graduating prospect decided on pursuing academic interests instead.

"To have nine kids and eight of the grade 12 kids sign - even our player that chose not to go on and play had opportunities, and they just weren't the right fit for them," Pavely said. "But, sometimes as a coach, those types of kids make you proud when they have to make mature decisions. They all want to keep playing hockey, but sometimes you have to choose moving on in life over going somewhere where you're not really going to get an education."

The trend of a post-secondary career seems to have been felt throughout the Sask Female Midget AAA Hockey League as well this season, as 34 grade 12s from around the league are continuing their game this coming season. Another seven returnees have already verbally committed for the following season as well.

That total of 34 graduates is the second-highest total all-time in the SFMAAAHL, trailing only the lofty 48 that signed in the 2010-11 season.

"You even saw it through the U18 Nationals - Saskatchewan getting a silver medal - the depth in Saskatchewan right now is pretty good," Pavely said. "You've got a number of really good programs in Saskatchewan that you could put up against all the programs in Western Canada."

READ: Silver at U18 Nationals Still Sinking in for Wildcats' Kendall, Kirwan

"When you have strong teams and a strong league, then kids are going to get opportunities, because scouts want to watch the strong leagues and better players."

The Wildcats however, weren't able to round out this strong season with a deep playoff push and more on-ice accomplishments.

We'll have the full recap of the Wildcats' 2019-20 campaign that saw a 21-7-1-1 record and second-place regular-season finish for you Monday.