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Daily Newspaper and Travel Guide
for Pecos Country of West Texas
Sports
Thursday, September 2, 1999
Eagles face tough challenge at Seminole
PECOS, Sept. 2, 1999 -- The may not have set the world on fire through
the first two-plus weeks of the season, but the Pecos Eagles have made
it into the championship round of both tournaments they've been entered
in so far this season.
That record will be put to the test on Friday, when Pecos travels to
the Seminole Invitational. The Eagles will play Lubbock Coronado at 11:30
a.m., then take on former district rival San Angelo Lake View at 3:30 p.m.
and Odessa High at 5:30 p.m.
The Eagles know about one of their opponents - they come off a victory
over Odessa High and a loss to Alpine in Alpine on Tuesday, which kept
Pecos at the .500 mark for the season, at 5-5 overall. As for the other
two, coach Becky Granado said, "I don't know anything about Lubbock Coronado,
but I know Lake View is good, they've won both tournaments they've been
in."
The Maidens took first place in the San Angelo Invitational last weekend
after winning the Ector County ISD Tournament two weeks ago. On Tuesday,
they swept Brownwood, 15-4, 15-6 to remain unbeaten on the season at 11-0.
Coronado, meanwhile, comes into play Friday off a 15-13, 15-7 loss to
one of Odessa High's district rivals, Abilene High.
The pool winner will play at 8:30 a.m. Saturday, as will the third place
finisher, in the consolation bracket. The runner-up plays in the quarterfinals
at 9:45 a.m., and the fourth place finisher will play at 10:30 a.m.
The Eagles are still having problems generating offense when junior
Philonicus Fobbs is not scoring, though Granado said Pecos' defense improved
on Tuesday.
"We hustled more on defense and were digging the ball out more," she
said. "We're still having a tough time, but we're picking it up more."
Aside from Lake View, Hereford will be the other top Class 4A team in
the tournament, paired with Odessa Permian, Lubbock Estacado and Amarillo
River Road in pool play.
Ailing Eagles face Denver City
PECOS, Sept. 2, 1999 -- A couple of former assistants will be looking for
their first head coaching wins tonight at Ratliff Stadium in Odessa, when
the Pecos Eagles open their 1999 football season with a 7 p.m. game against
the Denver City Mustangs.
It's the first game as Eagles' head coach for Gary Grubbs, and the first
for Denver City's Terry Summers, who, like Grubbs, moved up from an assistant
coach's role last season, when the Mustangs defeated the Eagles in Odessa
by a 20-12 final score. Luis Villegas ran for 169 yards and the game-winning
touchdown in the fourth quarter of the game, during which the Eagles lost
linebacker Robert Gonzales for a month due to injury.
This time, the Eagles come into the game without Gonzales' replacement,
Joe Robert Lara, or Lara's replacement, Omar Luna.
Lara hurt his knee two weeks ago, and will be out at least until the
start of District 2-4A play, Grubbs said. Luna took his place, but needed
emergency appendectomy surgery over the weekend. Add to that a knee sprain
suffered by offensive lineman Micha Huffman and an ankle injury to defensive
lineman Jacob Weidner, and Grubbs said Pecos will be either hurting or
inexperienced at several spots tonight.
"We're just having a bunch of bad breaks right now, but I still think
we're going to win the football game," he said, adding the Eagles do have
to perform better than they did in workouts earlier this week.
"We've just got to do a good job of executing. Right now we're having
a hard time in practice."
Denver City, meanwhile, missed the playoffs for the first time in several
years in 1998, and is looking at two quarterbacks to replace Villegas,
who graduated.
Sophomore Armando Galvan and junior Blu Kostelich are expected to split
time tonight. "We're probably going to platoon them for the first three
or four games until we get in synch," Summers said. "They both play on
defense also (at cornerback), so this gives us a chance to give them a
little rest."
"They're going to be plenty tough," Grubbs said. "We looked at the films,
and they've got a sophomore quarterback who's comparable to him (Villegas)."
"We watched them against Andrews and Seagraves, and their defense seems
to get a lot of people to the football," said Grubbs, though Summers downplayed
the Mustangs' scrimmage efforts against those two teams.
"We haven't looked good against Andrews or Seagraves," he said. "But
we have kind of long running goals to get a little bit better week to week."
"Defensively we seem to be real similar. We don't have as much size
up front as in the past," the Mustangs' coach said. Amado Rodriguez, who
has moved into a defensive end spot, has done the best job so far, Summers
added.
Including their two out-of-town scrimmage games against Monahans and
Greenwood, tonight is the middle of Pecos' five game "road trip" to start
the season. They'll go to Alpine and Fort
Pecos Enterprise
York M. "Smokey" Briggs, Publisher
Division of Buckner News Alliance, Inc.
324 S. Cedar St., Pecos, TX 79772
Phone 915-445-5475, FAX 915-445-4321
e-mail news@pecos.net
Associated Press text, photo, graphic, audio and/or video material shall not be published, broadcast, rewritten for broadcast or publication or redistributed directly or indirectly in any medium.
Copyright 1999 by Pecos Enterprise
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