Marble Falls boys soccer beats Bandera

CAPTION: Another vet doing his part is Drake Taylor, who scored the only goal in the match against Bandera March 13. Photo by Stennis Shotts

The Marble Falls High School boys soccer team defeated Bandera 1-0 March 13 to end the regular season.

“Bandera was playing for their playoff lives, and we really didn’t give them any quality shots and really possessed the ball the majority of the game,” head coach Ryan Craven said. “So that was cool to see that even with really our twos in the game for at least half of it, we were able to win it in the second half, and that was cool.”

The Mustangs (14-3-5, 10-1-1) had already wrapped up the District 26-4A championship earlier in the week. So Craven made some decisions in the line-up that allowed him to spread the minutes to more players.

Drake Taylor scored the winning goal on a penalty kick with 18 minutes left in the contest after Marble Falls had previously missed a penalty kick.

The coach noted the challenges in this match. Top of the list was the bus ride to Bandera coupled with some Mustangs who weren’t available for various reasons including competing at the regional powerlifting meet and allowing others to heal before starting the Class 4A Division I playoffs.

“With the a two-hour bus ride, it’s hard to start fast,” he said. “I really rotated a lot of guys out, so nobody really played more than probably about half the game in terms of minutes. So that was good. We rested a lot of people.”

Sophomore Erick Flores was named the match’s player of the game and Jostin Buezo Lopez also performed well.

“(Flores) really hadn’t played much probably the last five games just because of other players playing so well. He had an opportunity and played really, really well,” the coach said. ” Jostin stepped up and played well at the wing position, so it’s cool to see some guys that haven’t played a whole lot of minutes this year step in.”

Bandera needed to at least tie the Mustangs to advance to the playoffs. But the outcome meant the Bulldogs’ season is done.

“I don’t care who’s out there,” Craven said. “I fully expect us to go for the jugular and find a way to win this game because we wanted momentum going into the playoffs.”

Overall, the coach was pleased with the way the Mustangs finished.

“We saw a lot of really good stuff, had some guys who haven’t really played very many minutes that stepped up,” he said. “So that was good to see.”

Marble Falls will welcome Austin LBJ (10-4-2, 9-3-1 District 25-4A third place) at 7 p.m. Friday, March 20, to Mustang Stadium for a bi-district championship.

“They’ve had a lot of losing seasons,” Craven said. “But this year, they’ve totally flipped their program around. They were in the running for a district championship but fell a little bit short. They have confidence and they’re very athletic. We match up well against them just based on who we’ve seen this year. I think our district really prepared us for tough battles. They’re a good, good team that deserves to be in the playoffs, and if we don’t show up, then they could definitely spoil our season.”

CAPTION: Jose Campos Garcia (5) does his part to possess the ball and ensures he doesn’t touch it with his hand as Ismayl Ismaylov (11) looks on. Photo by Stennis Shotts