By ANDREW CRUM, Staff Writer
Pace beat itself on a wet afternoon against Donna North.
The Vikings’ offense had numerous good yardage plays erased by penalties and the Chief’s took advantage with their ground attack as Donna North defeated Pace 17-7 in their District 32-5A game Saturday at Sams Memorial Stadium.
“We put ourselves in a bad position in the first half with the holding penalties,” Pace coach William Deen said. “Good job on Donna North’s end, I’m happy for Donna North. Coach (Tommy) Sauceda is a good guy. But in my heart, I feel like Pace beat Pace, we shot ourselves in the foot.”
The Vikings’ defense struggled to contain the Chiefs’ Dominic Ochoa, who ran for 148 yards on 22 carries and one touchdown to lead Donna North to its first win of the season.
“We were able to run the ball successfully, and that really helped us,” Sauceda said. “We have a good (offensive) line and a good running back, and that’s what we’re going to live and die with.
“We kept going with our bread and butter and that got us a victory.”
Both teams struggled to get much going on offense with the constant wet weather. Donna North finished with 228 yards on the day, and Pace had 201.
Ochoa got Donna North on the board during the first quarter. He found a seam and ran 69 yards up the sideline to give the Chiefs a 7-0 lead.
In the second quarter, Pace tied the score at 7. Quarterback Luis Rodriguez found the end zone after a 32-yard run.
But just as quick as the Vikings tied the game, Donna North answered on the first play of its next drive. Alex Saenz hit Richard Gomez on a 73-yard touchdown pass to take a 14-7 lead.
Later in the quarter, Raymundo Galarza added a 47-yard field goal to extend the Chiefs’ lead to 17-7, and it turned out that was all they needed to capture not only their first victory of the season but their first district win as well.
“It feels great,” Sauceda said. “We’ve had some close (games), the first four or five ball games. Our kids have played hard. We’ve done a lot of good things, we just needed to make that one play to get us over the top, to get us a win.”
The Pace offense was moving the ball around the wet turf, but penalties were drive killers all afternoon.
“We couldn’t throw the ball, the weather affected us on that, but we knew we could run it and we tried to about 10 different ways,” Deen said. “We were making 5, 6 yards a lick there in the fourth quarter. I’m just frustrated on the penalty part.”
Sauceda said his team ran the ball even more than usual because of the rain, and it worked in the Chiefs’ favor.
“That’s what we hang our hat on, and that’s what the conditions called for,” he said. “We were able to do that and move the chains, and that helped us. It was our time today, and we’re going to celebrate this afternoon.”
Deen said his team can’t blame the weather for some of the miscues, it just needs to correct them.
“We made mistakes that hurt ourselves,” he said. “It wasn’t Donna North that hurt us, it was us hurting us.”
But he also thought his team wasn’t prepared to play.
“I never doubt my kids’ effort, my kids always give a great effort,” Deen said. “I just don’t think we were there mentally (Saturday) like we’ve been in the past. I don’t know if it was the weather, the game change or the start time, but that’s just an excuse. We should be ready to play.”
Andrew Crum covers sports for The Brownsville Herald. You can reach him at (956) 982-6629 or via email at [email protected]. On Twitter he’s @andrewmcrum.