CEDAR CITY, Utah -- For Thunderbird football head coach Demario Warren, the mantra since last March has been simple: 'Stay Ready'. 

The T-Birds only got a few days of Spring Practice in before COVID-19 rocked the college football landscape earlier this year, and didn't put pads back on until their 'Fall Ball' practices started about a month ago. 

"I like where we're at," Warren said. "We've got a team that's hungry and wants to get better every day. We don't know what's going to happen. We know that there's a spring schedule and we'll be ready for it, but we'd also be ready if they told us we could play next week, and I think that's the mindset that we have to take through all the uncertainty. It doesn't matter when the schedule lands, we need to be ready to play today, and embrace that mindset at all times."

The changes weren't easy to navigate, but at the end of the day Warren just implored his group to get back to the basics of the sport. 

"We wanted to just get back to playing football," Warren said. "Understand how to be fundamentally sound in terms of blocking, tackling, ball security, block destruction, and those are the things we really focused on for the first three weeks of camp. It was all fundamental work. We had to put some system in that we didn't get to in the spring, but at the end of the day we just wanted to get the fundamentals right and it showed as we wrapped up with a pretty clean scrimmage." 

With a full month of practice available, new offensive coordinator Matt Wade was able to finally get on the field and put a new system in place for the Thunderbirds. 

"They stressed the defense out in a lot of different ways," Warren said. "They did a good job of running the ball, but we're also able to take big shots when we like our matchups with our playmakers all over the field, so I like how we're giving the quarterbacks some different options out there." 

Similarly, on the defensive end, first-year defensive coordinator Robert Bala got his first taste of what it entails to command an entire side of the football.

"He just got more and more comfortable with what he wants his package to look like," Warren said. "It just continued to grow as we went on, and I thought the defense was very disciplined and much improved from day one to day 15."

'Fall Ball' culminated with a scrimmage last weekend where the team donned their jerseys and played a full quarter of football. 

"I thought they competed well, and we stayed healthy," Warren said. "We wanted to play the fourth quarter so some natural situations came up, we split up the teams so it was all even so we'll be able to evaluate guys based on how they react to real situations. So it's going to be fun to watch the film and see how they worked." 

As the calendar continues to move forward, Warren outlined what things will look like for the Thunderbirds as they continue to navigate an unusual schedule. 

"We'll have some training up until Thanksgiving, and then we're going to let them go," Warren said. "That's going to be hard, and it'll be a long break before they're back in January, but I trust this team. We've got some high character guys that will do things right, and a coaching staff that's tied in with the players and will be able to make sure they're doing alright. When you feel like you've got people that support you outside of your family it makes it easier to keep working hard and growing as a person. It'll take a whole team effort to keep growing over the next couple months, but we've got the guys that can do it."

Looking at the positives, Warren noted that he, along with his fellow coaches and players, got to do a number of things this fall that were out of the norm. 

"I got to see my son play every Friday, which was really fun," Warren said. "You're working 75 to 80 hours a week during the season, and for the past month we were still putting in a lot of time, but obviously not that much time. So I told the coaches and players that if something important came up that you normally don't get to do in the fall, then by all means make sure you get that done." 

In one of those games, DJ Warren got to suit up for the Cedar High School Reds at Eccles Coliseum, and made a big play on the field where his dad normally patrols the sidelines. 

"They put him in on varsity and he ended up getting a pick at the end of the game, so he was pretty excited," Warren said.

Keep tabs on the Thunderbirds all year by following @SUUFB on Twitter and Instagram and by liking the Southern Utah Football page on Facebook.