DENNIS SILVA II | STAFF WRITER
Eric Gonzalez tossed and turned all Sunday night.
The Weslaco High senior running back could hardly wait the seven or so hours that remained until the Panthers opened preseason practices early Monday morning.
And he wasn’t alone.
“I woke up at 5:30 this morning and I couldn’t wait to get to the fieldhouse,” Gonzalez said during a break during Monday’s practice. “I guess most of my teammates had the same mentality, because when I got here about half the team was already here.”
From players to coaches, the first day of preseason practices produces a range of emotions — anxiety, nervousness, excitement, anticipation. No matter how young or old, the feelings the days leading up to that first day of practice run rampant.
“It’s very difficult to sleep the night before,” said veteran coach Jorge Peña, who enters his first season at the helm of PSJA North. “I was here at 4:30 this morning, pumped up, and practice wasn’t until 7. You still have that bug in you.
“It’s a new program and the coaches and kids are anxious.”
The first day of practices might as well be a holiday. It’s a celebration of a new start. But that privilege of either blowing a whistle or putting on a helmet comes with responsibility.
“The real job is dealing with teenagers and getting them ready to work,” Mission High coach Mario Peña said. “You can get them physically in shape, but it’s more mental than anything else. It takes commitment. You can’t have a good program with part-timers.”
And on the first day, there were no part-timers around.
“If you’re in Texas, football is it,” said McAllen Rowe senior tailback Ino Rios, whose team is looking to avoid a second straight playoff absence. “I’m real anxious. The last month was the longest of my life.”
STORYLINES ABOUND
PSJA North is looking to rid itself of an ugly 0-10 2013 season. Weslaco High, meanwhile, holds great expectations, with 12 returning starters to a team that went to the playoffs last season. Mission High is facing a greater unknown: how will it fare moving up a classification?
Storylines like these, similar or exact, are everywhere this time of year.
“I’m on two hours of sleep, man. I couldn’t sleep,” PSJA North senior linebacker Martin Garza said. “We’ve been waiting for this. The last time we stepped on the field, we had completed a winless season. We’ve worked hard to get back here.”
North had a nice turnout for its first day, more than 90-plus kids. For Jorge Peña, who has to address a lot in a short amount of time, that was needed.
“The first thing you’ve got to do is find out why they went 0-10,” Jorge Peña said. “There was a lot of ‘me-first’ attitude and the concept of team wasn’t where I felt it should be. You identify those issues, and then you attack them. We feel confident we were able to do that.
“The kids are learning to be unselfish and they’re starting to play for the guy next to them.”
Jorge Peña said he demands just two things: great effort and great commitment. He’ll handle the rest, and it begins with a lot of newness, such as incorporating a spread offense at the school for the first time since the 1990s.
“We’re just trying to get things together,” senior offensive tackle Anthony Marin said. “We look good for the first day of practice, and the big thing is 0-10 is done. No more of that. We’re going to win.”
Winning is the norm at Weslaco High, playoff participants each of the last four years and eight of the last nine. But the Panthers aren’t just talking about making the playoffs or winning a district title. They’re talking about going to the third round, and possibly beyond, in the postseason.
Senior linebacker Brandon Torres made sure that mindset was where it needed to be in the days leading up to Monday’s practice.
“It’s about getting everyone’s mindset right,” Torres said. “We need to understand that we’re a force to be reckoned with, and we need to act and play like it. We are the Weslaco Panthers, and we go as far as we want to go.”
And, as is ritual around Weslaco, there are the never-ending inquiries to if this is the season the Panthers start airing it out more.
Cue the Tony Villarreal laughter.
“The question is always are we going to throw the ball more, you know, and my answer is always the same, yeah, sure, we’ll throw the ball more. In practice,” laughed Villarreal, entering his 10th season as head coach of the Panthers. “If we complete them in practice, I’ll do it in a game. It’s always about what you can master.”
THINKING ABOUT FOOTBALL
PSJA North and Weslaco High had good numbers for the first day of practice, about 90-plus in attendance for each. McAllen Rowe was OK. Mission High, however, was low.
“For 10th through 12th grades, we were about 70-75. Usually, my goal is to hit 100,” Mario Peña said. “We have 100 freshmen registered for football athletics, but a lot of kids will wait for the end.”
Mario Peña expects kids to show up as the days go by, but in a higher classification, he will need depth going against the likes of the La Joya and McAllen schools. But while the numbers may not be where they need to be for the Eagles, the confidence is.
“We can compete with anybody, and we’re going to win,” senior receiver Robert Veliz said. “We’re not here to settle for anything less.”
And this time of year, that’s every player on every team’s thinking.
“I didn’t sleep very good last night,” Villarreal said. “We started at 6:30 this morning with the coaches and that meant I didn’t want to oversleep. I was wide awake at 2:30, 3 a.m.
“It’s still exciting. We had a family outing at the beach yesterday, and then I’m watching the (NFL preseason) game last night and my son tells my wife, ‘Hey, look at Dad.’
“The juices start flowing and you start thinking about football.”