For the second year in a row, Tejas FC won the SE Campus soccer tournament, beating out both SE FC and Azteca in the final rounds.
Preparing for the final against Tejas, Azteca players Abraham Gonzalez and Geovanni Aguileva talked about the upcoming game.
“We’re very confident,” Gonzalez said. “We know what they can do, and they just saw us. It should be a good game.”
Aguileva was just as sure of his team.
“I’m willing to bet we can win,” he said. “We are the underdogs, so nobody is expecting it, but we can do it.”
Tejas was just as excited about the upcoming game.
“This is going to be an interesting final round,” said Julio Fernandez before the final against Azteca. “We are going to be more aggressive with them.”
Fernandez’ prediction was spot on with Tejas showing how aggressive it could be by scoring from midfield. Tejas pushed hard but could manage only a 3-2 lead at the half.
Azteca players were still confident that a win was within their grasp.
“We can win. We have to win,” said Gonzalez during the break.
“We are going to start shooting from the outside more,” Aguileva said. “We can’t out-juke them, so we are going to have to pass more too.”
Despite the slim lead, Tejas was calmer than before the start.
“We need to get our heads straight,” Fernandez said. “We’re still confident we can win this, though. The other team wants to win. We won’t let them.”
The second half began like a repeat of the first half with each team scoring a goal. Then, Tejas racked up five more goals while holding Azteca scoreless. The final was 9-3.
Azteca members stayed proud in defeat.
“We came in and showed them we weren’t going to lose 10-0,” Aguileva said. “We didn’t take advantage of the chances we had to score. Our passing held us back. We just kept trying to juke them instead of passing.”
Tejas laughed and celebrated its victory.
“We had to step up our game,” Fernandez said. “We started taking the game too serious, and we were not doing as well. We started just having fun and we won.”
The day’s first semifinal matched Tejas and SE FC. The last time these teams played each other, SE FC suffered a crushing defeat.
Tejas started the game strong with its aggressive style, but SE FC hung tough, trailing only 3-1 at halftime.
In the second half, Tejas’ players showed just what they could do while SE FC was unable to keep up or defend against their extremely aggressive footwork.
Tejas scored another four goals, bringing the final score to 7-1.
“Our cardio held us back,” said SE FC team member Nate Helm. “We were able to hold them at the half, and we were happy about that. In the second half, we just couldn’t keep up with them.”
Fernandez, or as his teammates called him, “the voice of the team,” played a key role but did not claim credit for the win.
“Our team chemistry is what makes us so good,” he said. “We try to just go out there and have fun. We also take it serious, but not too serious. When we take the game too serious, we get upset and bad things happen.”
The second semifinal pitted Moe’s Galaxy and Azteca with the winner to face Tejas in the final.
Azteca dominated the field from the start, outrunning and outplaying Moe’s Galaxy, quickly scoring goal after goal and winning 13-2.
