By ROY HESS, Staff Writer
A familiar name is returning as a high school soccer coach in Brownsville.
Juan de Dios Garcia has been hired to succeed Tino Villarreal at St. Joseph Academy.
Garcia retired as coach of the Hanna Golden Eagles after the 2012 school year following 30 seasons and a 437-206-66 career record.
The highlight of Garcia’s coaching career at Hanna came in 1990 as the Eagles went 19-3-1 and advanced to the UIL state tournament semifinals in Class 5A before falling 4-3 to Tyler Lee on a 22-player shootout. While Garcia coached at Hanna, the Eagles advanced to the playoffs 20 times and reached the regional tournament in San Antonio on seven occasions.
Four of Garcia’s former players at Hanna, now coaches, have taken teams to a UIL state final. Three of them have brought home state championships.
“We feel Juan de Dios Garcia is a perfect fit for us,” said Villarreal, also SJA’s head football coach who recently assumed duties as the Bloodhounds’ athletic director.
In soccer, Villarreal coached the Bloodhounds to the TAPPS state semifinals with records of 16-4-2 and 18-6-1 during each of the past two seasons. He said stepping down as the school’s soccer coach was a tough decision, but added he felt it was necessary so he can devote more attention in his role as AD to all of SJA’s sports, particularly those in the winter and spring months.
Garcia inherits an SJA team with seven starters returning, including previous TAPPS all-staters Mario Ramirez at goalkeeper, Jose Kauachi at center midfielder and Mario Garcia at defender.
“Coach Tino Villarreal has done an outstanding job with the St. Joseph boys soccer team,” said the former Hanna coach, 62. “There is tremendous camaraderie and brotherhood on the team. Coach Tino has turned this team into a family. I hear that the parents are very supportive. With a team like this, extraordinary things can happen.
“Coaching is in my blood,” Garcia added. “I do not know what I would do without it. I’ve been resting my mind and preparing myself for another coaching adventure.”
Garcia said he hasn’t really been out of coaching since leaving Hanna after the 2012 school year.
Starting in 2007, he served as an assistant coach for the women’s soccer team at the University of Texas at Brownsville and Texas Southmost College with one season (2013) as head coach. He continues as president of the Rio Grande Valley Soccer Coaches Organization.
Garcia is grateful to have had the opportunity to coach his grandson, Juan Antonio Garcia.
“I haven’t really left coaching,” Garcia said. “After I retired from my alma mater, Hanna High School, I coached the UTB women’s soccer team, and since then, I have been coaching my grandson’s team, ‘Las Aguilas’ in the under-5, under-6 and now under-7 division. I’ve had a lot of fun coaching the little ones.
“As a coach, one hardly ever leaves the profession,” he added. “One nourishes oneself with more knowledge obtained by attending soccer clinics, coaching conferences, watching games, sharing ideas with amateur and professional coaches, reading, attending symposiums and learning from game analysis by well-known soccer commentators. I’ve just been waiting for another opportunity to coach.”
Villarreal sees Garcia as someone who can guide the Bloodhounds to the next level in the TAPPS playoffs.
“We have a strong team and we need strong leadership,” Villarreal said. “We believe Juan de Dios can provide it. His reputation precedes him. He’s been a positive influence for a lot of young men, not only on the soccer field, but for life. We see him as the right person for the job.”
Garcia, a native of Matamoros, was inducted into the RGV Sports Hall of Fame in 2015 and was enshrined into the Texas Association of Soccer Coaches’ Hall of Honor in 2012. He once played soccer professionally in Mexico and was inducted into the Matamoros Sports Hall of Fame in 2005.
Garcia becomes the second former longtime Hanna coach to join the coaching staff at SJA. Dolores Olguin-Trevino was hired by SJA last fall to start a volleyball program at the school at the middle-school level.
Roy Hess covers sports for The Brownsville Herald. You can reach him via email at [email protected]. On Twitter he’s @HessRgehess