By FREDDY GONZALEZ | Staff Writer
LA FERIA — Long before any student stepped a single foot inside La Feria High School for the first day of class this year, Re-bea Fraga had already began preparing for her 26th season as head volleyball coach at the school.
Her long and successful tenure as the Lionettes head coach is backed up by a litany of trophies on display at the school’s gymnasium entrance.
However, if you look a little deeper –– beyond the trophies and beyond the record books — there lies a story not many know and a moment that could have changed Fraga’s ultimate path to La Feria.
It was the summer of 1984 when a young and eager 18-year-old Fraga graduated from the Ben Bolt High School.
With ambitions of fame and fortune, Fraga enrolled at the University of Texas at Austin and decided to go into a completely opposite field that she finds herself today.
“I started off thinking I was going to get into the computer science field and after that get my MBA and make lots of money,” Fraga said with a laugh. “But lo and behold, as a freshman I couldn’t get any of my classes toward my degree plan and I wound up taking a basketball class.”
It was at this particular moment that Fraga said her life was changed.
As she looked around Gregory Gymnasium at the University of Texas, “a light bulb went off in my head and all of a sudden I knew what I was suppose to do.”
The choice had always been in front of her, but now the decision was crystal clear. Both her mother and father had deep roots within her high school’s sports program as coaches. As a kid, she had fond moments spending time with her parents traveling with their teams on away games and loving every moment of it. Now, everything seemed to fit perfectly.
Coaching was always the answer and now she knew it.
“I was lucky because I found out at an early age what I wanted to be,” said Fraga. “I have coached kids that have graduated college and still don’t know what they want to do.”
In both her mind and heart, Austin was always going to be her final destination after graduation. Orange was always her preferred color and maroon had always been her bitter rival’s color.
In high school it was Agua Dulce that wore maroon, so in college it was only appropriate that new rival Texas A&M donned maroon.
Upon graduation from UT in 1989 with a degree in education, Fraga was found looking for somewhere to work.
Luckily for Fraga, her mother had seen an ad in the newspaper for a head coach at La Feria ISD . The rest, as they say, is his-tory.
Fraga remains the most successful coach in La Feria history and has led the Lionettes volleyball program to the postseason each year she has been in charge “expect for maybe two,” she said.
And she has no intentions of retiring anytime soon.
“I’ve been blessed to have been employed by La Feria for all these years,” she said. “I enjoy the family oriented community and it’s been a great place for my children to attend school.”
Fraga’s Lionettes are, as usual, on the verge of another playff spot and, with just one loss in District 32-4A, in contention for the league championship.
The Lionettes are at Hidalgo tonight.