By MARIO AGUIRRE | STAFF WRITER
DONNA — Nerves kicked in as soon as Kevin Quiroz heard the final horn to end overtime.
The La Joya Juarez-Lincoln goalkeeper has been in this position before — with the game coming down to penalty kicks — but never with the stakes this high.
As soon as Quiroz positioned himself in front of the net, though, he found his comfort zone. The junior deflected two shots by Brownsville Veterans Memorial, with another sailing wide left, and his teammates came up big by drilling three PKs to pull out a 2-1 area-round win on Thursday at Bennie La Prade Stadium.
“What can I say? My teammates are the most important part,” Quiroz said. “We’ve been working hard daily. We’ve been working hard at everything.”
Quiroz, in particular, has focused part of his practices each day to penalty kick scenarios, simulating “a playoff game,” he said.
It came in handy during the second round of district, when Quiroz was anointed the Huskies’ full-time starter. He encountered two such scenarios since then, with the junior emerging successful each time.
So when he stopped the first two Brownsville Veterans shots on Thursday, “I felt confident in myself,” he said. “All this time practicing, it paid off.”
The win helped the Huskies (21-7-1) advance to the third round of the playoffs for the sixth time in coach Victor Ramos’ seven-year tenure with the program.
“With his confidence and dedication in practice, he showed he wanted to improve,” Ramos said of his goalkeeper. “He had 3-4 key saves throughout the game, and one of them after halftime, and that’s why we’re here (going to the third round). He did a tremendous job, stopping three penalty kicks.”
The Huskies, which closed out the regular season ranked No. 9 by RGVSports.com, will now take on No. 1 Brownsville Rivera, which beat Del Rio 3-1 on Thursday.
At the end of regulation, the game was tied at 1. Juarez-Lincoln’s Juan Cruzaley scored on a straightaway look from 15 yards out, after taking a pass from teammate David Segura with 36 mins. remaining before halftime.
With 26 mins. left in regulation, Brownsville Veterans countered. Gabriel Montoya, who converted the Chargers’ lone penalty kick, took a pass from teammate Ramon Perez, who took it down the wing and passed a defender before crossing it to Montoya for the equalizer.
It gave hope to a Brownsville Veterans team that was coming off its first-ever playoff victory — a 3-0 win over Edinburg North in bi-district — heading into the area round.
But the Chargers’ first penalty kick was too low to the ground, and the ensuing attempt wasn’t much better, as Juarez-Lincoln’s Segura, Jimmy Castañeda and Angel Garcia each buried their tries to seal the match.
“It’s tough when something like this is decided on penalty kicks, but that’s the way it is,” Brownsville Veterans coach Alberto Vasquez said. “Congratulations to them. We’ve been fighting to earn respect being a new program, from the city we’re from, and I think we’ve done that. I couldn’t be prouder of the kids.”
He added: “It’s really tough to lose this way. I asked for them to leave everything on the field and they did.”