SAUL BERRIOS-THOMAS | THE MONITOR
LAREDO — With Weslaco East down seven points in the first quarter, senior quarterback Richard LeFevre came to the sideline with a bit of a limp. He didn’t return for the remainder of the opening period.
“I just told Richard ‘It’s all right,’” senior wide receiver J.C. Vargas said. “‘Lets’ go, let’s get it taped up, and let’s get to it.’”
Fitting that Vargas was the one saying that, as he, too, is just coming back from an injury.
LeFevre recovered and fired back onto the field, leading his team to points and a lead. East never gave that advantage back and went on to win 21-18 over Laredo Alexander on Friday at the Laredo Student Activity Complex in the area round of the Class 6A Division II playoffs. East will once again face Cibolo Steele — the team East faced in last year’s third round — at 7:30 p.m. Friday at the Alamodome in San Antonio.
“It feels good,” LeFevre said. “We get another week of football. Another day. It feels really good. It’s a blessing, to be honest, because more than 95 percent of the teams are out now, and we are still getting to put our helmets and our shoulder pads on now.”
Vargas and LeFevre were East’s main weapons on offense. LeFevre went 4-of-8 passing for 32 yards, and he carried the ball 19 times for 93 yards and a touchdown. Vargas had 115 rushing yards and two TDs.
“J.C. played quarterback off and on before he got hurt,” East coach Michael Burget said. “So, him coming back, it helped. And then we had a young man, Pedro Puente, come in (at quarterback) and take some snaps, and he did great when he was in there. He helped us move the ball. I have another QB, Danny Salinas, who was ready to go, so we have a bunch of people ready to go. We coach all of our kids. We don’t know who is going to get hurt week to week, so I am very proud of the kids’ effort they had. We traveled. We stayed overnight. They woke up. I guess we didn’t get the wake-up call, but we got it in the second half.”
Vargas opened East’s scoring when he broke free for a 30-yard touchdown run to tie the game on the first play of the second quarter.
Alexander added a field goal before the half, taking a 10-7 lead to the locker room.
The second half swung things for East. LeFevre attempted just one pass in the final 24 minutes. East held the ball, draining the clock and pounding the Alexander defense.
“LeFevre went into the locker room and said, ‘Coach, my knee does not hurt that bad,’” Burget said. “‘I want to run. Give me the ball.’ When that guy says that, I’m giving him the ball.”
His team has learned to expect that type of heroics from LeFevre.
“Richard should win MVP because of what he has done this year,” Vargas said. “We lost three of the stars, and Richard put the team on his back. He got the team to the playoffs.”
Vargas missed six games this season due to injury, and last season’s leading rusher, Roy Pedraza, has been sidelined by injury since September. Pedraza’s backup, senior running back Freddy Gonzales, also missed seven games this year.
Vargas isn’t the only one who thinks LeFevre deserves credit for helping the Wildcats persevere.
“He’s a big-time player,” Burget said. “If he is not the MVP of South Texas, I’ll be shocked. There aren’t too many quarterbacks that could — with the loses we have had — average about 45 points the last five games, by putting the offense on his back. I know people can argue better quarterbacks, but nobody has done more for his team than Richard LeFevre.”
All LeFevre asks in return is that the Wildcats believe, as he believes, that East can win next week.
“It would be a great feeling to go to a fourth round,” LeFevre said. “I think that would be the first time in school history. We want that as bad as ever. Getting that ‘W’ in the third round would be tremendous.”