By ROY HESS, Staff Writer
HIDALGO — As far as all-star soccer competition goes, the West is the best.
The West All-Stars validated that notion, at least this year, by winning all four games of Saturday’s 10th annual Rio Grande Valley Soccer Coaches Organization East-West Senior Showcase at Valley View.
After the Class 6A boys and girls matches ended with the West teams triumphing by identical 4-1 scores, the West held on to also win the sub-6A girls contest 5-4 to put the last team for the West in a position to go for the Showcase sweep in the sub-6A boys game.
The matches became more closely contested throughout the day, and the sub-6A boys game was particularly hard-fought. The sub-6A West boys squad built a two-goal lead and held on to triumph 2-1, making it a sweep for the teams from the Upper Valley.
In that final match of the day, the West led 1-0 on a first-half goal by Sharyland High’s Mark Stephens before teammate Luis Pecina of Valley View made it 2-0 with 26 minutes remaining.
Brownsville Porter’s Jose Pardillo of the East tallied a goal to close the gap to 2-1 with just under 20 minutes to go, but the East team came no closer and Pecina’s goal stood up as the game-winner to sweep all matches for the West.
“We had a good opponent and we were under pressure the whole game, but my teammates created a chance to score for me and I had a good run at the goal,” said Pecina, who will play soccer next school year at Our Lady of the Lake University in San Antonio. “It became a very important goal for us. It was my last high school game and I’m glad I got to score.”
The third game of the day was the most unpredictable as the sub-6A West girls led early 3-0 only to see the East battle back to tie it 3-3 with 28 minutes left.
From there, Hidalgo’s Andrea Espinoza of the West scored back-to-back goals within a three-minute span to give the West a 5-3 advantage before Edcouch-Elsa’s Genesis Martinez put in a goal to narrow the score to 5-4 with seven and a half minutes remaining.
Espinoza finished with three goals in the match as teammates Gabriela Estrada of Hidalgo and Vanessa Guevara of Sharyland High each contributed a goal.
Besides Martinez, also scoring for the sub-6A East girls were Weslaco East’s Xitlaly Hernandez, E-E’s Leslie Alvarado and Weslaco High’s Teresa Zuniga.
Because some of the sub-6A East girls were taking the SAT exam Saturday, their team was short-handed to begin the match and the squad picked up some 6A players from Weslaco.
In the 6A girls match, McAllen Memorial’s Daisy Robles led the West with a pair of goals and teammates Etzamar Rios of Edinburg North and Krysta Armstrong of Edinburg Economedes each added one.
Weslaco East’s Hernandez scored the lone goal for the 6A East girls, becoming perhaps the first player in the history of the RGVSCO event to ever tally goals in two separate matches on the same day.
Leading the 6A West boys to their 4-1 victory by scoring a goal apiece were McAllen High’s Adrian Rodriguez, Edinburg North’s Balan Gutierrez, McAllen Rowe’s Jose Nunez and Edinburg Vela’s Carlos Aparicio. Weslaco East’s Daniel Lerma scored the goal for the 6A East boys.