By ROY HESS | The Brownsville Herald
Soccer took a break earlier this week as Mother Nature invaded the Rio Grande Valley with more cold weather.
After postponements and cancellations of Tuesday’s games, the season resumes today with tournament play plus on Friday with more non-district matches.
There are at least two Valley tournaments for varsity teams starting today — the 12th annual “La Copa Frontera” Hidalgo-Valley View Tournament for boys and the Progreso Lady Red Ants Tournament. There are 16 teams entered in the boys tournament at Hidalgo and Valley View, while there are 10 teams participating in the girls tournament at Progreso.
Each tournament is dividing teams into two groups for pool play today and Friday with a tournament championship match scheduled for Saturday — 1 p.m. at Progreso and 8 p.m. at Hidalgo. There will also be pool play earlier Saturday in the boys tournament.
From the Metro Area, Port Isabel’s girls are playing at the Progreso event, while Rivera, Porter and Los Fresnos are among the boys teams playing at the Hidalgo and Valley View Tournament.
The pool-play group for Los Fresnos and Rivera includes Hidalgo, La Joya Juarez-Lincoln, McAllen Rowe, Laredo Alexander, Mercedes and Monte Alto. Porter’s group includes McAllen High, Grulla, Mission High, Edinburg IDEA Quest, Laredo United South, La Joya Palmview and McAllen Memorial.
This week’s tournaments offer pretty much a last chance to fine-tune things as district starts next week for most of the Valley’s teams. Actually, District 31-5A already has begun.
“Our goals and expectations are the same as these past two weeks (when we’ve played in tournaments),” said Rivera coach Salvador Garcia, who is starting his 21st season of guiding the Raiders. “We want our young players to experience what varsity competition is all about. We are still trying different looks and formations to see what is better for us.
“We have a couple of players out because of minor injuries and we want to avoid even more injuries,” he added. “To be healthy is going to be vital for our District (32-6A) competition (that starts Jan. 26).”
The same objective at the tournament exists for the Porter boys.
“Well, our main goal is to stay healthy,” said Jose Espitia, now in his 11th year of directing the Cowboys. “At the same time, we want to try out different formations and lineups depending on the game situation. We know that District (32-5A, also starting Jan. 26) will be very tough and we want to be able to compete and compensate our lack of (varsity) experience with heart.”
McAllen High defeated Juarez-Lincoln 3-0 in last year’s “La Copa Frontera” final.
PROGRESO EVENT
Port Isabel’s group for pool play at the Lady Red Ants Tournament includes Hidalgo, Lyford, Zapata and Edinburg IDEA Quest. The tournament’s other pool-play group consists of Progreso, Raymondville, Grulla, Rio Hondo and Monte Alto.
Lady Tarpons coach Jesus Cardenas, now in his sixth season of guiding the Port Isabel girls, said his squad will be playing at less than full strength in the Progreso Tournament.
“We have been hit by the injury bug, and other UIL events going on at the same time or day limits my options with the team,” Cardenas said. “I hope to get healthy through this tournament and give my freshmen (varsity) experience. Anything else would be icing on the cake.”
The Lady Tarpons are coming off last Saturday’s 3-0 win against Monte Alto.
District 31-4A action for Port Isabel’s girls and boys starts Feb. 9.
GAMES OF INTEREST
There are some interesting non-district matchups scheduled Friday in the Metro Area.
For the girls, two of them are McAllen Memorial at Lopez and Brownsville Veterans Memorial at Los Fresnos. Both are scheduled to start at 6 p.m.
On the boys side in the area on Friday, it’s IDEA Frontier at Port Isabel at 6 p.m., St. Joseph Academy at Pace at 7 p.m. and PSJA High at Brownsville Veterans at 7:45 p.m.
There are some interesting matches on the road Friday as well for Metro Area teams. The Lopez boys play Harlingen South at 6 p.m. at Boggus Stadium, while the Pace girls are at Edinburg Vela at 8 p.m. Also, the Porter girls are at PSJA High at 7 p.m.
Roy Hess covers sports for The Brownsville Herald. You can reach him via email at [email protected]. On Twitter he’s @HessRgehess