LA JOYA — When La Joya Palmview guard Arturo Gutierrez showed up for weightlifting the Saturday after his team fell to 0-4, something was different. Coach Manuel Flores, always the first one in the building, was nowhere to be found. The following Monday, Gutierrez and his teammates learned that Flores had been unexpectedly reassigned.
“We were all surprised,” Gutierrez said. “Some of us were emotional. Some of us were doubting each other, like, ‘Who’s to blame?’”
Flores was the only coach Palmview had ever known, and suddenly he was gone. Special teams coordinator Mage Requenez stepped into the role and tried to right the ship, but a confused and distracted team skidded to a 1-9 season.
Now entering his first full year as head coach, Requenez has changed nearly everything. New coordinators, new assistants, new packages and new practice routines, just to name a few.
Requenez hopes the shift leads to an easier and more successful season.
“It was hard; the kids were very close to coach Flores,” Requenez said. “It was a struggle just to keep the kids motivated day in and day out, to show up. … But we kept it together, and we regrouped during the offseason, and it’s paying off. It’s really paying off.”
The first change was to bring in four new assistants.
J.J. Leija comes from PSJA North to take over the defense, bringing in a third package designed to help Palmview do better against the run.
Offensive coordinator Gary Lauer comes in from Mission, and he will lead a unit that is expected to be built around a strong run game. The strength of the offense should be the line, which has learned a lot of “old-school techniques” under new coach Ernesto Lerma, tackle Jonathan Garcia said.
“He’s been pushing us a lot harder,” Garcia said. “It’s a big difference from last year. … We have a big different mentality around here. We’re here to win.”
Once the staff was in place, the next step for Requenez was to find more players. Numbers and depth are always an issue at Palmview, so he and his assistants combed the corridors during the spring, looking for kids who played as freshmen or in junior high and might consider a return.
Requenez has also switched up Palmview’s practice routine. Instead of doing the same thing every day, he tosses in variations each session — one of many techniques he learned from the videos he’s watched, the camps he’s attended and the material he’s read since he took over the job.
Even the stretching routines and special teams periods are entirely different. Gutierrez said practices were sometimes lazy and unfocused last season, but he and his teammates believe that’s a thing of the past.
“There’s been a lot more discipline here,” defensive back J.D. Alaniz said. “The extended time (Requenez) has had, he’s totally changed the program a lot. Everyone is buying into it.”
POWER ATTACK
La Joya Palmview’s offensive line boasts a powerful, quick guard tandem in Gutierrez and Michael Rodriguez, plus a pair of strong tackles in Garcia and Hector Barrera. Given the team’s increases in size and strength over the summer, Gutierrez thinks the running attack will be a bigger part of Palmview’s offense.
“We’re going to rush the ball on defenses,” Gutierrez said. “We’re going to pound the ball every single play.”
Requenez said he still wants to maintain balance, but added that the run game will be more attacking and aggressive.
“I think we might be running the ball a bit more this year,” Garcia said. “We want to be a powerhouse.”
BANGED-UP BACK
A key part of Palmview’s downhill running game will be fullback Jose Bernal, who has been on varsity since his sophomore season. Despite nagging injuries and the team’s overall ineffectiveness, Bernal racked up 470 yards and five touchdowns last season.
“Hopefully he’ll be ready for this year,” Requenez said. “We have high hopes for him. He can really pound the ball on people. It’s just that we didn’t get to see him too much last year, because he got hurt very early in the season. He played, but he wasn’t the Bernal that people were used to seeing his sophomore year.”
TRENCH WARFARE
The front seven will be Palmview’s strength on defense. Requenez said the defensive line is the unit’s best attribute, and that the team is returning all three starters at linebacker for the first time in school history.
“We have a great D line,” Alaniz said. “I think it’s going to be one of the top D lines in the Valley this year.”
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PROGNOSIS
Palmview should be strong on both sides of the line of scrimmage, and the Lobos have nowhere to go but up. With a new staff in place, Palmview is in for a shakeup.
2014 record: 2-8
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TENURE
Coach: Margarito Requenez
Year at School: 1st (was interim for final six games of 2013)
Record at School: 1-5