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Fort Stockton broke out to a 9-0 lead in the opener, then held off a
Pecos comeback that cut the margin to 10-8, with a closing 5-0 run
earning them a 15-8 win.
Then in Game 2, the Eagles were within one point of a victory, only to
see the Prowlers score seven points in a row, the last five while Pecos
was unable to break serve, as the Prowlers won 16-14 to tie San Angelo
Lake View for first place in the District 4-4A standings.
It was Fort Stockton's first victory in Pecos in over 15 years, while
Pecos dropped to 1-2 in district and 9-12 overall with three straight
road matches coming up, beginning Saturday at Big Spring.
"I'm going to be positive, I'm not going to be negative. We're going to
win," said Eagles' coach Nora Geron. "I'm not going to be a quitter.
We're going to win."
Fort Stockton got some key kills out of Elsa Espino in the second game,
while Angela Granado put down some spikes in the match-opening 9-0 run.
But the final streak by the Prowlers was mostly self-inflicted by the
Eagles, who smashed three spikes over the back line and one into the net
to allow the Prowlers to tie the score. An Espino ace and a spike by
Manuela Pando after a long volley finished things off.
"No mental toughness," was Geron's explanation for the collapse. "When
you're mentally tough, you play under pressure. When your not, you fall
apart."
However, she went on to say "At least it's beginning to hurt some.
They're not laughing and joking like they did before," Geron said,
referring to home losses to Kermit and Odessa Permian earlier this month.
Ivy Thorp came up with a couple of kills in Game 1 to start Pecos'
comeback, while Pando had problems with her own spike attempts. Her last
error made it 10-8, but Lori Marquez was whitslted for a net violation,
and Espino then took over, spiking a ball off Gail Taylor for one point,
then tipping it in between Pecos' defenders to close out the game.
Spikes by Marquez and Thorp, along with a block of Granado by Sherrie
Mosby, lifted Pecos to a 7-3 lead in Game 2, and they then fought off
one Prowler rally that narrowed the gap to 8-5. Marquez had a spike to
make it 12-6, but when she rotated to the back line, the Eagles began to
struggle.
After two spikes and a block by Espino made it 12-9 the Eagles appeared
to right themselves, breaking serve and score on a bad spike by Mindy
Lujan and a kill of an overset by Mosby. But with game point Veronica
Carrasco stumbled trying to handle a Prowler hit, and the Eagles were
unable to rotate Marquez up to the front line after that.
"We're playing pretty ball, there are just some spots where we lack
mental toughness and mental discipline," Geron said. "We're not being
beaten by physical mistakes, we're losing due to mental ones."
Not only did Fort Stockton end their long loss streak in Pecos, and
raise their season record to 10-9, they also swept the freshman and
junior varsity matches as well. The Prowlers won the JV match, 15-6,
15-12, took the freshman purple team, 15-12, 11-15, 15-7, and beat the
ninth grade gold squad, 15-9, 15-7.
PECOS, Sept. 25 -- Pecos Eagles' senior Mauricio Villescas took first
place this past weekend in cross country competition at the Seminole
Invitational.
Eagles' cross country coach Brannon Jackson said Villescas, who won the
District 4-4A title in the 3,200 meter run this past April, ran the
three-mile course in Seminole in 16 minutes and 59 seconds. "He defeated
last year's district champion from Lake View (Justin Haby) on the final
kick."
Villescas cut six seconds off his time from two weeks ago, when he ran a
17:05 in the Ector County Invitational, finishing 10th while Haby was
seventh in Odessa on Sept. 7.
"Every team in the district was there expect for Sweetwater," Jackson
said of the Seminole meet. "We had seven runners including Mauricio last
week, so it was the first week we had competed at the team level. They
didn't keep team points, but we would have come in second behind Lake
View among our district."
Jackson said the next highest individual finisher for Pecos was 23rd.
"They were all bunched up around there," he said. A total of 58 runners
competed in the meet.
Jackson said all six 4-4A squads will be competing this weekend at the
Big Spring Invitational, which will give the Eagles a better idea of how
they stand going into next month's district cross country meet. The top
two teams at district will advance to regional competition, and the
Eagles will be seeking their first regional berth in three years.
State and Regional Sports Pages--San Angelo Standard-Times
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