FREDDY GONZALEZ | Valley Morning Star
RIO HONDO — After finishing District 32-4A with an impressive 11-3 record, the Rio Hondo Lady Bobcats grabbed the second playoff seed and are ready to face what lies ahead.
Their postseason journey begins against a tough Port Aransas team at 6 p.m. Monday at Kingsville High School.
“I feel like we are ready because we’ve been preparing this whole season for this and I think we’re good to go,” said senior Taylor Gomez. “We didn’t accomplish our first goal of winning the district title, but I have confidence in my team that we can accomplish our second goal, which was to make it to the second round (of the playoffs).
“We have gotten closer as the season has gone by and our team chemistry has gotten stronger. I would say we’re a family because we are so close now and also because some of us are actually family.”
Teammate Victoria Vasquez agreed that the team is ready to take on the playoffs head on.
“I feel very excited to get back to the playoffs,” said Vasquez. “We look a lot better now because we are working as a team and we’ve gotten closer to one another, and that makes us a better team.”
But while the team is looking forward to facing the Lady Marlins on Monday, the Lady Cats will do so knowing the team hasn’t been beyond the first round since 2014.
While the team did have a successful district season, it didn’t come without its share of bumps along the way.
“We’ve had a lot of ups and downs, and had to face some distractions but through it all the girls have really stuck together as a team and really persevered,” said Rio Hondo head coach Robert Jaramillo. “We’ve been fortunate because it’s hard to key on one player and we really don’t have one big scorer, but they are all averaging seven, eight or nine points so when you stop one someone else has been there to pick it up. I think staying in games with teams like Hidalgo and Palmview have really prepared us for the playoffs.
“I told them to just enjoy the playoffs because only four teams get to represent the district so they should be proud of the fact that they are one of the representatives from 32-4A, and do they are going to do the best that they can.”