By ROY HESS, Staff Writer
First came the start of fall football workouts Aug. 3. Now it’s time for the first round of scrimmages.
All Metro-area high school teams will be playing scrimmages Friday except Lopez, Pace and Porter, which just started fall workouts Monday, one week after the others because the Lobos, Vikings and Cowboys played spring ball in May. Those three teams will be scrimmaging next week.
Sams Memorial Stadium will be a busy place Friday as Brownsville Veterans Memorial will have its varsity going against La Joya High at 9 a.m. Also Friday at Sams, Rivera will scrimmage Mercedes at 6:30 p.m.
Teams also will be scrimmaging with their freshmen and junior varsity squads. Most, if not all of them, will be playing prior to the varsity sessions.
Chargers coach David Cantu said the goal is to keep things somewhat uncomplicated in this initial scrimmage.
“We plan to stay very basic and allow many opportunities for our younger boys who are still trying to establish themselves as varsity candidates,” said Cantu, whose team is coming off a 6-4 season.
Rivera coach Tom Chavez will be simply looking for ways to help his team get better when the Raiders scrimmage Mercedes at the same location later in the day.
“It’ll be a little different speed (going against another team),” said Chavez, whose Raiders went 7-6 and advanced three rounds in the playoffs last season. “I want to see some improvement. It’s not going to happen overnight, I know, but I still want to see improvement.”
Another busy place for football scrimmages Friday will be Bennie LaPrade Stadium in Donna. The Port Isabel varsity scrimmages Donna North there at 10 a.m. Later at the same site, it’s the Los Fresnos varsity going against Donna High at 7 p.m.
“It’ll be a good way to see where we’re at,” Tarpons coach Monty Stumbaugh said of the scrimmage against Donna North, a team that will be playing its second season of varsity ball this fall. “We’ll be looking for effort and who can be physical. We’ll be trying some players out at some different positions to see who’s going to get to play (in the starting lineup).”
Besides the games at Sams, another scrimmage Friday in Brownsville will take place at Canales Field, where St. Joseph Academy’s varsity goes against Rio Hondo at 6 p.m.
SJA coach Tino Villarreal said Rio Hondo brings a physical aspect to its matchups that should provide a good test for the Bloodhounds.
“We need to solidify our starting 11 on both offense and defense,” Villarreal said. “I’m particularly interested in finding the right attitude.
“We are preaching an aggressive mentality, so we will use Rio Hondo as a measure of hard-nosed football and see which Bloodhounds rise to that level of toughness,” he added.
The Hanna Golden Eagles play their first scrimmage Friday against Weslaco High at Weslaco’s Bobby Lackey Stadium. The varsity scrimmage is scheduled for 6:30 p.m.
“I’m anxious to scrimmage to see where we are,” Hanna coach Rene Medrano said. “Our guys are anxious to scrimmage, too. After more than a week (of practice), we’ve been going against ourselves too long. A scrimmage is just what we need right now to see where we are and to see where we need to improve.”
Roy Hess covers sports for The Brownsville Herald. You can reach him via email at [email protected]. On Twitter he’s @HessRgehess.