By the time the Stampeders’ second and final pre-season kicks off on Friday night, there will be barely 24 hours remaining until Calgary has to set its roster for the start of the 2012 season.

So with football coaches not being the sort to do last-minute cramming, much of the roster-crunching has been done in the three weeks of training camp to date including last week’s pre-season opener against Edmonton. But not all of it, which means Friday night’s contest in Regina (7 p.m., QR77) is still very significant.

“Obviously, we’ve gone through our perceived starting roster, our perceived practice roster and things like that,” said head coach and general manager John Hufnagel after Thursday’s walkthrough practice at McMahon Stadium. “But when you have a position with two or three names on it, where it’s still an open battle . . . we have a lot of those on the board. So (Friday’s game) means a lot.”

So a player on the wrong side of the bubble today still has a shot to fight his way back into the picture with a strong showing on the eve of the roster deadline.

“It has happened,” said Hufnagel. “It definitely has happened.”

There’s no secret to what the bosses are looking for.

“Our priorities for last week’s game are the same as this week’s game,” said Hufnagel “No. 1 is to further our evaluation on the players and try to win the football game. As far as the players are concerned, it’s to continue playing with great effort and concentrate on the discipline. I don’t want the discipline to be a sometimes thing, I want it to be an every-game thing.”

For a second straight week, Drew Tate will get the start at quarterback.

“I’d like to see him get a half,” said Hufnagel. “We’re going to structure the game just the way we have done the previous four seasons and hopefully we can establish some consistency in the first half and do a better job catching the football for him and blocking for him and hopefully he’ll do a better job of seeing the field.”

“The more reps I get,” said Tate, “the more ready I’m going to be. It’s not just time and plays but quality time and good plays. That’s really what I’m looking for.”

In his fourth year with the Stamps but his first as a starter, Tate is looking for offensive improvement from last week’s contest.

“We’ve still got a long ways to go,” he said. “I really believe that. But the good thing is we have another opportunity to get better as a team, as a unit and personally. We don’t take these things for granted. This is our job and this is how we get better at what we do. In practice, too — it all starts there.”

Once the final gun sounds on Friday night, the real work begins for the coaching staff.

“The to-do list is to come back home, evaluate the film, meet as a staff and make decisions,” said Hufnagel, who has until 8 p.m. MDT on Saturday to set his roster.