The last season for Warwick Veterans football is almost here, but one wouldn’t know it from looking at the team.

The ‘Canes are abiding by the motto passed down from Principal Gerald Habershaw to make the final year a “celebration” rather than a “funeral.” That resilience has shown in the football team, which entered its third full week of practice on Monday, and their first-year head coach Rob Pacifico.

“These kids are resilient,” Pacifico, who teaches math at the high school and was an assistant football coach at Vets for 10 years, said. “These kids are very resilient. Sometimes their resilience comes across as goofy and it’s frustrating to us adults but they’re very resilient. As a staff we’ve already started to talk to them about what school they’re most likely going to based off where they live, and that they can’t use this is as a reason to stop playing. These kids, and from what I see in the building as a teacher, these kids are pretty strong.”

That strength is expected to carry over into the regular season, as the ‘Canes look to win games in the here and now after not pulling down a victory in 2014.

Senior quarterback Nick Beaufort will lead the staff after he won the starting job in practice. It didn’t come easy, though, as Beaufort encountered stiff competition from sophomore James Baldwin.

Pacifico said that their arms were virtually the same in terms of power and accuracy, making the decision a difficult one. He said the separating factor in the end was Beaufort’s speed on the ground and intangibles.

“His leadership and his running ability,” Pacifico identified as the traits that won Beaufort the starting job. “Those are things that James can develop I’m sure, I’m confident of that, but as a sophomore they’re not there yet. Nick Beaufort’s pretty good with the ball in his hands with the play fakes, with running the zone read, running the offense the way we need it. As far as their arms, they’re so similar. We couldn’t make a decision. We made a decision based on the leadership and the running game.”

Beaufort will have three solid wide receivers lining up with him as well. Pacifico pointed to juniors Richard Bateman and Daniel Pratt and senior Jacob Isaac as the trio who will give Beaufort several options down the field.

In order for Beaufort to find those guys, though, his youthful offensive line will have to mesh quickly to ward off the rush.

“They’re working together and becoming a unit,” Pacifico said. “There’s gonna be at least one sophomore starting there. It’s just reps. That’s what it comes down to.”

However, Beaufort won’t just be an option on the offensive side of the ball. Pacifico said he will play both ways this season, alongside a Vets defense with a stout back seven. Junior Nate Ferri is expected to be the standout in the secondary as he “probably [has] the best instincts of any of our defensive backs,” according to Pacifico.

Juniors Mike Isles and Kendall Watts have been shining at the linebacker position, fortifying what has potential to be a strong pass defense through the middle.

The squad benefits from last year’s freshmen gaining experience through practices with the older players over the final few weeks of the 2014 season. Sophomores, such as Baldwin, were thrown into the trenches with upperclassmen to make them better players as the season wore on.

Pacifico said that he has employed that same philosophy to start the 2015 season, pitting his freshmen players against the more veteran guys to make them better. And it seems to be working.

“From what I hear, our freshmen are leaps and bounds ahead of where the freshmen were this time last year,” Pacifico said. “We have to go faster to keep the older kids going, get ready for the varsity games. So the freshmen are gonna be playing the JV, they’re learning right along. They’re behind our varsity, but ahead of where a normal freshmen squad would be.”

In terms of rust, there’s been very little for Pacifico after taking a four-year hiatus from coaching. He worked alongside the same assistant coaches during his time under former head coach Mike Nappa, who retired last year.

“For the most part I have Mike’s staff with me and I’ve coached with them for years before I took the hiatus,” Pacifico said. “There wasn’t that awkward learning curve of us getting to know each other. That’s actually been very smooth.”

Pacifico especially lauded the work of Mike Nappa’s son and fellow assistant coach, Brian, who helped fill in for his father at times.

“[Brian] is doing a fantastic job,” Pacifico said. “Over the past few years he’s done a hell of a job.”

The ‘Canes will have a couple opportunities to get their feet wet before regular season games start up. They will face off against Toll Gate (6:45 p.m.) and Pilgrim (7:30 p.m.) when they host the annual Injury Fund tournament tonight.

Chariho, which went 0-7 in Division II-B last season, then comes to town. The true tests begin after that non-league bout, though.

Vets takes to the road to visit Rogers (5-2) and then Central (3-4) before returning home to play five of its final seven games at home. Three of those contests are league games, with Coventry (4-3) providing the toughest test.

Vets will have the benefit of hosting a couple of weaker teams, too. Mt. Hope (1-6) will come to Warwick on Oct. 9 and Woonsocket (2-5) travels down three weeks later on Oct. 30.

Unfortunately for the ‘Canes, though, their two toughest games of the year will both be away from home. On Oct. 16, Vets travels to Shea (6-1), which fell in the D-II championship game last season. League play closes out a few weeks later on Nov. 6, when the ‘Canes will take a trip to tilt with St. Raphael, which went 7-0 in the 2014 regular season.

Despite a schedule with several challenges, Vets isn’t fazed.

Pacifico said the team is taking the season one day and one practice at a time as they prepare for each game, despite the fact that some may be eager to see who they will play down the road.

“These kids, a couple of them today [Monday] were asking about schedules, and who do we play with, and I’m like ‘Let’s get through Monday’s practice,’” Pacifico said. “I know it’s boring, the kids don’t wanna hear it because they’re not excited about it, but we just got to take one day at a time. One day at a time, one play at a time. Forget about what happened yesterday, forget about what happened 10 minutes ago, we gotta move forward.”