By ROY HESS | THE BROWNSVILLE HERALD
The most dramatic game during Thursday’s opening day of pool-play action at the 36th annual Brownsville ISD boys soccer tournament was a late-afternoon match that went to extended penalty kicks.
When Rivera took on Laredo LBJ in a Pool D matchup, the match went to PKs with the score tied 1-1 after regulation play ended.
Earlier, Rivera led 1-0 at halftime before LBJ evened the score late in the game. Because it is a tournament, no overtime was played.
The extended PKs involved 14 players taking a penalty try for each team before LBJ prevailed to take the game by the official score of 2-1.
“(Just) one of those days,” Rivera coach Salvador Garcia said in response to the tension-filled contest.
Rivera went 2-1 on the first day of the three-day, 28-team tournament that runs through Saturday at BSP. The final is scheduled at 1:30 p.m. Saturday.
The Raiders opened the day with a 1-0 PK victory over Brownsville Veterans Memorial before downing PSJA Southwest 2-1. Then came the extended PK shootout with LBJ.
Rivera plays three more pool-play games Friday. The top four teams in each of the four pools advance to the quarterfinals in the Gold and Silver brackets on Saturday.
Porter led the way for the Brownsville schools on Thursday by going 3-0.
The Cowboys, winners of last weekend’s inaugural Southmost Classic tournament, opened Thursday with a 4-3 win in PKs against La Joya Juarez-Lincoln before triumphing 1-0 over Rio Grande City and 3-0 over McAllen Memorial.
Lopez and Pace each went 2-1 on the tournament’s first day. Lopez won 2-0 against La Joya High and 9-0 against Raymondville, but came up short against Donna High 2-1.
Pace triumphed in PKs twice against Hanna (2-1) and Edinburg High (2-1) with a 2-1 loss to Harlingen South.
Hanna was edged by Pace and McAllen High (1-0) while defeating Laredo St. Augustine 6-0. Brownsville Veterans suffered PKs losses to Rivera and Mission High by 1-0 and 2-1 scores, respectively, while beating San Benito 2-0.
McAllen High went 2-0 on the day by winning against Hanna 1-0 and McAllen Rowe 1-0. The Bulldogs play four times Friday.
Mission High also enjoyed a 3-0 start to the tournament.
Donna High went 3-0 with wins against Laredo United South (2-0), Lopez (1-0) and Harlingen High (2-0). Sister school Donna North also went 3-0. The Chiefs’ wins came against McAllen Memorial (3-2), RGC (3-0) and Los Fresnos (1-0).