By ROY HESS, Staff Writer
Considering the rainy, cold weather of the past weekend, no one is complaining too much that the 33rd annual Brownsville ISD Boys Soccer Tournament was moved back this year for the first time to the second week of the season.
Except for 2015, the event has inaugurated a new season of UIL soccer in the Rio Grand Valley during early January for 30-plus years.
Previously, the tournament often has taken place with less than ideal playing conditions due to the weather, and there’s still no guarantee Mother Nature won’t affect things again, even though the tournament was moved back one week.
All that the participating teams can do is hope it will be played under favorable climate conditions because they all want to get in as many games as possible before district starts for most of them at the end of the month.
The three-day, 32-team boys tournament begins Thursday at Brownsville Sports Park. The three-day, 28-team BISD Tournament for the girls will be taking place at the same time and at the same site, so, weather permitting, there will be plenty of soccer played at BSP through Saturday. In total, there are 66 games scheduled for the boys and 105 for the girls.
The girls will have pool play with “mini-games” featuring 20-minute halves, and the boys will have bracket play all the way through for the first time in recent memory with full 40-minute halves. Penalty kicks will decide all ties for boys and girls matches.
The Porter Cowboys won last year’s boys championship with a 2-1 victory against Laredo United in the final.
“I like playing the full games in this tournament,” said Porter coach Jose Espitia, whose team begins play at 1 p.m. Thursday against Laredo LBJ. “Knowing that if you lose (any game in the bracket play format), you’re out of the running for the championship, and that adds a different kind of pressure than when you play pool-play games. It’s like the same situation we all face in district, so I like the pressure about it. You get to practice what you’re going to face in district.”
Added Rivera coach Salvador Garcia, the tournament director, “Hopefully, the weather will cooperate with us. I think that the competition is going to be great in preparation for the (teams’) district openers.”
SJA UPDATE
The St. Joseph Academy Bloodhounds are 8-1-1 on the season and coming off decisive wins over Raymondville (11-0) and Port Isabel (7-1).
They’ll be playing in the BISD Tournament again this year along with fellow TAPPS district member San Antonio Antonian. The Bloodhounds open tournament play at 9 a.m. Thursday against Brownsville Veterans Memorial, a team they tied 1-1 on Jan. 5. A win would pit them against Edinburg North or Rio Grande City later in the day.
““It will be tough,” SJA coach Tino Villarreal said of the tournament. “There will be some great tests for us.”
HEADING NORTH
The Los Fresnos Falcons are one of several Valley teams entered this week in Corpus Christi’s Gulf Coast Tournament, which begins Thursday. Other Valley teams in the boys tournament include Donna High, Edinburg High, Edinburg Economedes, Edinburg Vela, Weslaco East and PSJA North.
Another team not playing in the BISD Tournament is Sharyland High, which won the Brownsville event three out of four years from 2010 to 2013. The Rattlers were runners-up in 2011. They didn’t play in the BISD Tournament last year, either.
Also, Progreso is playing host to a tournament Friday and Saturday with IDEA Frontier of Brownsville as one of the eight participating teams.