PSJA North drops back-and-forth playoff battle against New Braunfels

CORPUS CHRISTI — No team in the Rio Grande Valley has won more playoff games over the last five years than PSJA North.

The Raiders established themselves as a gritty group who will punch you in the mouth and fight for 48 minutes until the clock reads zeroes.

Their Region IV-5A DI area round playoff game against the New Braunfels Unicorns was no different, but the Raiders failed to land one last blow in the bout as they fell in a 35-32 thriller on Friday at Phil Danaher Stadium in Corpus Christi.

PSJA North wraps up its season as District 15-5A DI tri-champs with a 10-2 overall record. The win sends New Braunfels to 9-3 overall and into next week’s regional semifinals for a matchup against Smithson Valley.

“These guys have the heart of a champion,” PSJA North head coach Marcus Kaufmann said. “They do not want to lose. They do not want to let anybody down, and it’s more about letting the fans and the community down more than winning and losing for these guys. They’re down because they wanted to win for the community and we weren’t able to pull it out, and you can tell it hurts right now.” 

PSJA North and New Braunfels went toe-to-toe for four quarters and neither backed down. PSJA North fullback Andrew Alvarado and quarterback Daren Garcia scored first half rushing touchdowns in short yardage situations, which New Braunfels matched with a pair of touchdown runs from athlete Cole Redding for a 14-14 tie at the half.

After the break, the two continued to exchange score for score and stop for stop, but a couple key mishaps ended up coming back to bite the Raiders in the end.

Garcia scored his second rushing touchdown of the night to pull ahead 20-14, but the extra point bounced off the left upright to keep it a six-point game.

New Braunfels responded with a Clayton Namken touchdown pass to Cayden Mills and their extra point went wide to keep things tied at 20-20.

PSJA North running back Ethan Guerra kept the chains moving for the Raiders all night and finally broke free for a 44-yard touchdown run late in the third quarter to go up 26-20, but the extra point missed again.

Namken and the Unicorns answered right back with a 31-yard touchdown pass to Cameron Pitts and the extra point was good for 27-26 New Braunfels lead.

Garcia hit the hat-trick for PSJA North with his third rushing score of the evening on a 3-yard run to the left pylon, but a two-point conversion was unsuccessful to make it a 32-27 game with minutes to play.

New Braunfels landed the final significant strike of the evening with a 4th-and-goal touchdown from the 1-yard line on a Redding touchdown pass to tight end Lyric Lalley, followed by a successful two-point conversion leap in front 35-32 with 55 seconds remaining in the fourth.

PSJA North reached midfield before time ran out on the Raiders as the Unicorns went on to celebrate their area round playoff win.

"We played tough. We played good football. They're a good football team, so at the end of the day it was about who was more disciplined, who wanted it more, and they were on the right side of that,” PSJA North senior linebacker Jesse Montez said.

PSJA North’s 10-2 season is the program’s fourth 10-win season in a row as the Raiders also captured a third-consecutive district championship.

The Raiders graduate several key starters but will bring back a group ready to put this year’s area round heartbreaker behind them.

“Most of the season, we were talking about how young we were. We had a lot of kids grow up on the fly, so we’ll be back next year stronger because this senior group did a great job of teaching our young guys how to fight for the team,” Kaufmann said.