With Dean Bailey, Kelly O'Donnell, Sean Wellman, Josh Mahoney, Chris Connolly and John Meesen arriving at the club, as well as Mark Williams moving to full-time development coach, Rivers said Demonland was buzzing with enthusiasm.
"It is a bit like the first day of school. It's definitely exciting for everyone and we're all looking forward to it," he told melbournefc.com.au.
"Dean's been great. He's got a lot of knowledge about the game, so we're starting to get into some more meetings now and he seems to know what he's talking about.
"We're all very excited about it, we're starting a clean slate, and it should be good.