By ROY HESS, Staff Writer
Brownsville Veterans Memorial, Lopez, Los Fresnos and McAllen High each won three pool-play games apiece to become frontrunners in their respective groups during Thursday’s opening day of the 18th annual Brownsville ISD girls soccer tournament.
Lopez and Los Fresnos are co-leaders with 3-0 records in Group B. They square off in their group today.
The three-day, 28-team tournament at Brownsville Sports Park continues today with pool play in four groups before the field is narrowed to 16 teams for Saturday’s bracket play in the Gold and Silver divisions.
In the fourth group, Pace, Hanna and La Joya High all had 2-1 records after the first day of pool play, but the Lady Vikings were ahead by one point over the other two teams for having their first match go to penalty kicks even though they lost.
Brownsville Veterans won all three of its matches by 1-0 scores against La Joya Palmview, Donna North and PSJA Southwest. Scoring goals for the Lady Chargers were Sam Bodden, Kat Bodden and Ana Karen Garcia.
“We played good today and we were organized in all three games,” Lady Chargers coach Luis Troncoso said. “We were competitive against some strong teams and our girls kept their composure even though it was tough at times.
“The wind was pretty intense in the earlier games and that made things more difficult,” Troncoso added. “We tried to play the ball more on the ground (when it was windy). We held strong when we needed to, and we came out (of the tournament’s first day) feeling good after a lot of hard work.”
Most of the tournament’s teams will have three pool-play games again Friday. A few will play four games.
Los Fresnos has won the past two BISD Tournaments. The Lady Falcons continued their strong play Thursday by defeating Edinburg Economedes 3-0, Donna High 3-0 and Rio Hondo 5-0.
Lopez, which made it to the BISD Tournament final one year ago, opened play Thursday by beating Rio Hondo 3-0, Economedes 2-1 and Donna High 2-1.
McAllen High had little trouble in Group C as the Lady Bulldogs defeated Edinburg High 4-0, Porter 2-0 and Mission High 5-0.