BY GREG SELBER

 

CORPUS CHRISTI – Strangely, a chilly evening now, a bit of mist off and on, but clearly through the onrushing night, the horns sounded the way with a clarion call of ecstasy. As the joyous caravan made its way from cement-clad Buccaneer Stadium down Leopard Street, the honking reached a fever pitch. All the vehicles which had brought them to this momentous moment – painted with slogans and fighting words, warnings to the enemy, and jersey numbers of beloved boys – were leaving the scene with jubilant passengers, after their team had become the first in the long history of the football-mad school to run its record to 13-0.

One poor sumbuck had run his truck onto a median, and though it looked like $1,500, easy, judging from the crippled left front wheel, he didn’t care. He was off in a crowd of madcap and zany fans, whooping it up all the same.

This was the scene, postgame, after Harlingen had blasted San Antonio Warren with a barrage of defensive genius, returning four interceptions for touchdowns to stomp its way onward. Four, you read it right.

The Cardinals’ resounding 53-28 victory sends them to the region finals against San Antonio Madison, a 51-40 winner over Laredo United Friday. That state quarterfinal game will take place Friday night in Kingsville, and it will be holy Hell, but for now, one must pause for reflection. Time enough for tomorrow, tomorrow.

The game just played will surely stand along a choice few others as one of the greatest afternoons in Valley history. There is no doubt of that. After Omar Hunter came down with the sixth pick of Warren’s Rex Dausin (a half-Dausin picks, it must be said) in the final ticks, bedlam ensued. Who made the rule that spectators can’t come down out of the crowd to join the celebration? You hold him, I’ll hit him. The Harlingen fans did their best to ignore the statute. Some made it.

Athletic director Randy Cretors threw his coat down on the turf and issued forth with a ringing rebel yell, just before he bear-hugged winning coach Manny Gomez. Those two luminaries represent the recent version of the ageless greatness that is Harlingen football, and as they embraced in the afterglow, the football kids were doing the same, with whoever was in range.

And there were plenty of people to hug, given that the Cardinal throng had filled its side of the ancient field with a mighty presence, spilling over to the Warren side by the hundreds. Two hours before kickoff, them folks was ready!

After having come so close so many times in the third round, this time the Cards and their supporters were here to win.

Not necessarily to put the lie once and for all to the (boring) Valley Week crap, though that had definitely been part of the week’s preparation leading up to Saturday. Not necessarily for media accolades to follow (Daniel Ybarra, one of the head ball thieves against Warren along with The Chosen One, Randy Bermea, got some nice Channel 4 airtime with Clay). And not necessarily for the glory that goes with becoming only the fourth Valley 5A team since 1989 to get over this hurdle, the first since EHS in 1999.

No, the Cardinals and their faithful wanted to WIN. And that was because…because…because they really, truly love the game and their team. They live for it. They live to win.

Gomez has always said that the Cards do not play against other teams; rather, they compete against themselves, trying to fashion the perfect night every time they go out there. Like the old Port Isabel powerhouses, these guys go out there with zero questions, no hype, no BS. They go out to slay, and they generally make a habit of it, with 47 scalps now in their last 52 fights.

So, yes, it was good to advance, great really, especially with a ton of ex-players on hand including Michael Uribe and Harvey Noyola. It was very cool to finally be able to stick it to the San Antonio media (Valley WEAK? En tu cara, tonto). And the ride will continue next week with a winnable if daunting chance coming against a Madison team that has made a 25-year pattern out of advancing this far.

But the bottom line is, the Cards came out on the most important day in their history – on the same field where they had slogged their way past Austin LBJ 22 years ago to reach the fourth round – and they did it. They lived up to all the predictions, the productions, the prognostications and the press pontification. The massive load of hopes, dreams, expectations, such a responsibility on their shoulders. Representing the Valley only falls to the bravest.

And Harlingen did carry the Valley banner.

Beyond that though, in essence, they lived up to the motto that will always be near and dear to their hearts. They showed once again that…wait for it…Cardinal Spirit never dies.

 

LONG-AWAITED DAY

There is really nothing quite like a traveling band of Valley football fans. They just inhabit a place, swarming with purpose, and Occupy Corpus was the name of the game Saturday. To start, it was warm, unseasonably so, and at 12:30 the Harlingen contingent hung onto coats and hats, sweating freely by the thousands: the entirety of Warren fans could have fit into a relatively large conversion-van.

Though the purple crowd showed up eventually, they were no match for the enemy. Or its coach.

Gomez stood on the sidelines before the game and for a moment was lost in time. His Apache shifted ever so slightly.

“This same field, you know,” he said out of the side of his mouth, eyes never leaving the Cards warming up in front of him. “I remember being here in ’89, before we beat LBJ…looked up, saw my pop up there.”

This amounted to a burst of sentimentalism one has come not to expect from the hard-working Card leader, except in brief, tantalizing flashes. He’s more likely to growl and glower, in the best sense. Bother him at the wrong time, and it’s Bad News.

At any rate, perhaps The Hit Man knew what the Warriors were about to find out, which was that after painstaking study, hours of plotting, planning, and scheming, Harlingen was all over Warren’s game-plan like a pair of pants. And that would be that, eventually.

It’s called Saturate the Zone and it means that a defense, in order to beat a Spread team, needs to be where the ball is, and be fast about that. Gomez and his crack staff had watched Warren films until their eyes bled and they were out of popcorn. So when Dausin came up to the line of scrimmage on Play One, he could not know that disaster courted him. Ybarra was in the right place at the right time, grabbing the first pass of the day and running all the way for six. The stunning turn of events posted the theme of the affair. You toss, I grab, we win!

“We wanted to disguise what we were doing, keep them guessing on our coverages and the rush,” said Gomez, whose chess-game work against Warren mentor Bryan Dausin amounted to sheer murder. “You get the DBs to the places where they like to throw, and if you get pressure on the passer, chances are they’re gonna make some mistakes.”

Everyone has a gameplan, and most are probably airtight in the realm of pure theory. However to execute the drill with precision and timing, in real-time, it just doesn’t always happen.

But with Tadeo Rodriguez, Justice Ortega, and the rest of the defenders getting in on the 6-foot-3 Dausin more than he has become accustomed to dealing with, part two of the scheme came together.

Ybarra’s pick-six took just seven seconds. Harlingen kicked off. Three Redbirds (Daniel Ramirez, the incredible Nathan Prado, and Ortega)  combined to slam Jared Owens down for minus-2. Ortega, who would later injure a knee, crashed in to sack Dausin for minus-8.

Then, Bermea. The Chosen One.

He could be a movie actor, this handsome lad, and yet has little of the bravado and surface personality associated with posers of that ilk. The Valley knows him as a state-meet hurdler and super-fast receiver. Saturday, he became a defensive back too, working both ways in this tightest of spots. Talk about a brilliant move.

On Play Four of the game, he intercepted a bad pass from Dausin against the wind and hot-footed it all the way, weaving a path 36 yards from side to side and then exploding across the goal with a wayward Warrior hanging on for grins.

Harlingen had not deigned to run a single snap from scrimmage, and yet led 14-0. After last week’s oh-so-close call against Del Rio in area, the wakeup call arrived and apparently had hit home. At 10:14, 14-0, Angry Birds!

Now Warren had come in 11-1, we know, with a fine offensive attack and a hard-hitting defense. No way were the Warriors going away so soon and to punctuate the point, Dausin now launched a laser beam into the sky, completing an 88-yard touchdown pass at 9:17. As comforting as the first two lightning bolts had been for the Cards, this bomb was as shocking. Eee, it’s on!

Still, a 7-point lead without running a play is pretty slick, so after the defensive strategy paid dividends, the Harlingen offense went to work. The first offering was a 41-yard breakout from quarterback Kevin Ledesma all the way to the Warren 31, with a 15-yard late-hit flag thrown in for good measure. This was almost too much to take, like discovering a big ol’ bag of cash by the side of the road. Or finding out that the chick sitting next to you on the plane is a Playboy bunny. You don’t say?

But from here the Cards missed a knockout blow, as a holding call and subsequent fumble on a poorly run Wildcat play resulted in no points.

Still, the defense was on fire. That unit forced a Warren punt, after Little Big Man Jesus Zuviri chased down a receiver from behind. The defenders’ generosity was much appreciated, and this time, Ledesma and the glamour cats on the other ball side aimed to take advantage.

Harlingen would rush for 139 yards and add 122 passing, for a fairly pedestrian total of just 261, by far its single lowest output of the campaign. But each time the Cards needed a big drive against a physical and rough Warren bunch (that Chris Brown, No. 34, was simply unblockable) they got it. That’s a lot of points with just 261 yards.

Ledesma converted a third-and-2 chance with a 3-yard run, for which he paid the price. Brown and strapping free safety Dalton Miller tattooed the Baby-Faced Assassin all day, but he never blinked. Again, the senior hammered forward for a first down, but man, it was tough going against the Warriors Saturday.

A crisp completion to Charlie Powers (six for 72 and he gets better every week) along with a nice piece of running for 10 from Brian Blake set them up close. Soon, Blake swept in from the 5 and it was 21-7 at 1:56 of a first quarter that seemed to last longer than a visit from the in-laws. Huge drive and score. Huge.

At this stage, what have we here? Valley Week, when all teams south of San Antonio show up to get slaughtered. Well…ha.

Warren tried to get going, completing some balls, but the Warriors would have more trouble running it than Harlingen (63 total). With Prado playing the game of his life (so far), the Redbirds stopped them and forced another kick. Ortega made a sharp tackle on the series and then rushed Dausin into an incomplete to clinch it. He had a great half.

Harlingen’s D is the classic example of the type of unit it takes to beat the Spread, which is why Gomez and staff were secretly licking their chops all week. Speed and quickness, combined with knowledge and execution, can jam up the seams, and pressure on the QB…you heard Manny earlier.

First period passed into second, gratefully, with the teams trading ineffective blows following the bang-bang beginning. Then, after letting a punt roll down to their 16 and having the ensuing punt sail only to their 47, the Cards game-planned again.

Ybarra, the lithe of limb basketball star, leapt into the lanes and stole another, racing 70 yards for a TD with a fantastic cutback left to right. A flag on the return nullified the score, and Harlingen eventually had to settle for a Grant Gorman field goal of 37 yards. But it was beginning to look like a Johnny Jackson moment; the Harlingen legend of old returned three interceptions all the way, for the University of Houston one night against UT back in 1987. He wasn’t at the game in 2011, but he was, too.

So far the Cards had made a couple of miscues: a fumble and a big penalty on the runback. Blake had actually scored on the drive, but a hold called it back, leading to the field goal. Add another, a personal foul call on the ensuing kick that set Warren up at the 49 late in the second.

Dausin, who threw for a career-high 452 yards and six touchdowns in the team’s area-round win over SA Churchill, got it cranking just now. In six plays, he had the Warriors in the end zone, narrowing the gap to 10 at 24-14.

It seemed like a potential Danger Zone, for as well as the Cards had performed, stopping the Warren attack fairly succinctly, it sure seemed like they should have been up more than 10. Murmurs from the gallery.

And it got worse, as Harlingen went three-and-out, and down came Warren. The Warriors began at the Harlingen 39 after a miserable 11-yard punt, and quickly reached the 23 with a minute left. However, up stepped the Redbird stop crew as Rodriguez barreled in to force a wide toss and on fourth and six, Dausin’s pass was slightly off target again, with Cards in his face.

That stop was MONEY. It had to happen, or psychologically it could have been a crippler. The way Valley Week usually happens, as you know, is, the local team gets bum-rushed way early and then hangs out waiting for the Facebook pictures at the end.

This weekend, with Harlingen winning and Memorial coming damn close against SA Reagan, one imagines that the tide will continue to turn. As the area coaches will tell you, there isn’t that much difference between us and them. We’re bigger, faster and stronger than we used to be, and the teams upstate, based on the Law of Diminishing Returns, have seen their curve flatten out a bit in that regard. Throw in excellent coaching, improved facilities, and training/camps/special work, and the answer is, despite a speed/quickness advantage still, the Enemy Teams need to wake and smell the java. No cakewalks this year.

MILES TO GO BEFORE SLEEP

Though they held the lead in this battle for the region final, the Cards had not exactly set the world, or Warren, on fire with offense. The holes that were there in the past were closing so much more quickly against an athletic foe. Ledesma had less time to throw than in any contest since last year’s playoff against Stevens.

But nonetheless, Harlingen started the third period off with a positive slant, thanks to some guts on a gamble. Blake (18 for 51) rocketed 23 yards for a first down at the Harlingen 37 but the drive stalled. Upback Hunter then made the grade with an “A,” rushing 22 yards on a fake punt down to the Warren 41. This was simply a stunning reversal. Killer call.

The Cards would battle to a field goal of 32 yards from Gorman, his second solid effort into the wind, making it 27-14.

Enter Bermea.

“This is the first time I have been back there on defense so much,” he would say later, as the dazzling feat gradually sank in. “Our coaches told us all week, they showed us what they [Warriors] run and what to expect, the tendencies. So we sort of knew a lot of the stuff they were doing.”

One would say that Bermea knew, because he floated under a Dausin bomb and outran the entire Warren club, again sideline to sideline, for a 62-yard pick-six that was like a solar-plexus punch to the gut of the purple side.

No, no, that isn’t the best part. That came with the two-point conversion, where a loose ball was picked up by Warren but somehow made it back onto the hands of the amazing Bermea, who almost ran the damn thing in!! At that point, a keen observer with eyes trained on the Warrior sideline could discern a touch of despair. Sort of like the endless chase scenes in “Butch Cassidy and The Sundance Kid.” Recall the line…

“Who are those guys?”

They’re the guys up 33-14. You know, the Valley guys.

Warren could have quit here but to its credit, did not. It instead marched 83 yards in 15 plays, working the short-passing magic and getting some nifty runs from Dausin. For the game, the Sam Houston State signee was 22 of 48 with six uh-ohs but 345 yards. All the yards between the 20s won’t matter much if you’re tossing them to the other team with regularity too, we are reminded.

But that answering drive, making it 33-21 on a short Dausin smash, sobered up the Cards as the fourth period began.

“We believe it! One more quarter to go! We’re not done yet!”

The Cards can always count on team leader and holler guy Daniel Ramirez to get to the heart of matters. They had never trailed, had made the stupendous defensive plays, and yet, 12 points is not a ton, means two scores and you lose, really, Mr. Half-Empty.

To cinch the deal, to end the suspense, to advance to the fourth round, and to ensure that the ride back south would not be a somber death march, Harlingen had to answer the answer. In most of the third round games area clubs have competed in recently, such as Harlingen against Judson in 1989, Mission against Aldine a year later, and EHS against Eisenhower in ’99, the stronger teams (not ours) either slowly took control, or had issued the whoopin’ at the start.

Only this time, with the Cards looking for 700 points in the near future, the answer would be clear. Not today. No way. Our game.

Once again Ledesma (18 for 65, many bruises today) churned for a key first down, and Blake was enormous on a fourth-and-1 slam into the line that netted a chain-move to the Warren 39. From the 32, Killer Kev lofted one down the left sidelines and Powers snagged it, way above some poor 5-foot-7 sap trying to D up the 6-5 wideout. It went for 30 yards to the 2, but it would take the Redbirds four tries (a motion call hurt) before Ledesma hurtled into the middle of the line like his helmet was exploding, finally getting the touch at 4:14. Kid wanted it!

This made it 39-21 and showed that the Cards were not one of the teams of old, trying not to lose, hoping to maybe do something. They were here to win. Win.

Prado, who made 10 tackles and was close to about five more, noted after the game that his teammates had been motivated by many elements.

“We’re family, that’s the thing,” said the 175-pound senior who is high in the running for Valley MVP; he just gets in every play. “We used that Valley Week thing to an extent, no one up here thinks we are good competition. But we also came in with the plan, we knew Warren inside and out, we kept that quarterback guessing…he’s really good, but we…man, this team is a force to be reckoned with!”

Gomez laughed when suggesting that he and the defensive coaches seem to re-invent the wheel every week. He knows, as Prado does, that a crew without outstanding size had better have the wheels and brains. They did. They do.

“We brought everyone, from all angles,” said the coach about his twisting, stunting defenders. “And we even dropped ends, tackles, into coverage. Put people where the ball is, and good things happen!”

You mean like another pick-six? Why yes, indeed. After Harlingen kicked off, Ybarra soon galloped in with the latest INT inside of four minutes to extend the log to 46-21. Game over. Really over.

Warren would score again, but so would the Cards as Powers (looking like a college player these days, and maybe not hoops) loped half the field with an onside kick to add to the wound, final score 53-28.

 

MAGICAL MYSTERY TOUR

There will be days ahead to test the resolve of the program, but that is as it should be. Harlingen rolls on to the fourth round knowing that a victory over Madison will catapult it into the Final Four in Division I. What surprises lie in store for Friday night? What film study is taking place at this very moment? What flavor Blizzard this week?

The Mavericks may have gone just 6-4 in the regular season, but they played a killer sked, have gotten it churning now, and are no easy out. Not even close.

However, Harlingen is feeling it, too. Early in the year the Cards went out and made the bold move of taking on powerful Abilene, a stroke that at this point is so exquisitely perfect as to be nearly sublime. They then proceeded to pound away on all comers in their league, scoring points in bunches from every angle and position group. In the playoffs they had a laugher against Los Fresnos and then nearly a crier versus Del Rio, 37-34 nail-biter it was. Wakeup call.

Now they have slain the media dragons, dispatched the challenger from the Big City, and prepare to take on a program that has been at least four-deep in the playoff eight times. Damn.

This may not be quite the Madison that outlasted the Weslaco Panthers in the third round back in 2007 and kept going. But it can run the ball with speedy backs, something Warren was not capable of doing. For those who have been quietly suggesting that the Cards would finally meet their match in a more physical, larger club with great speed, this may be the week they have waited for. Maybe, maybe not. Maddie D, she no good.

Truth is, no one knows how far Harlingen can go. The dream lives!

“When I was a kid, I first figured out what the state playoffs, the state title, all that, I learned what it was,” the splendid Bermea said. “I always wanted to go, to be a part of it.”

Before the game, like three minutes before, he had been sitting on the sideline training table, barefoot. Waiting for a last-minute ankle taping. One coach joked that he was going to run like the Kenyan long-distance kings. Noyola, who knows something about speed, as he was Bermea before Bermea was Bermea, told the high stepper, “Track meet all day, baby, all day!”

Right on, except the running events mainly included DBs on breakneck slides the other way. Still mind-boggling. You go ahead and call us the next time you see five pick-sixes in one game, four that stand. G’head.

Meanwhile, Gomez was smiling the sort of honest wide-face one seldom sees from the gruff warrior, and it warmed the cockles of all hearts that witnessed it.

“These kids believe in themselves and they believe in the program,” he stressed. “That’s why I am so proud of them. All we want to do as coaches is make them better men, through football. And to see them face a challenge like this and come out good, man, it doesn’t get any better. They showed their capability, and the hell with Valley Week really…bottom line, we are winners and we don’t care who we play. Ever!”

Gomez added that having the enormous and vocal crowd on hand was a big help. He remembers the thousands of people who followed the ’89 team. He knows that 14,000 mad fools drove up to Houston back in 1990 to see Mission and Koy Detmer tempt the fates against an unbelievably good Aldine group (This Observer hitched up there with the late, great Buddy Green along for the adventure…wish the Bud Man could have been at Buc Stadium).

“The fans are awesome, and we love ‘em.” Gomez said. “But the key is to make sure the kids know, the fans ain’t out there making plays, that has to be you. The way to win these big games, I guess, is to have your team prepared and really thinking they can win. I know we felt like we could win, all week. Never a doubt, nothing against Warren, that’s a good team. But we believed. We believe.”

So 13-0. That’s the record now. And the Cards will get their first shot at the Real Rare Air since 1989. December football. When coaches first start working their kids, sometimes in the spring, sometimes August, they help them set goals and then try and assist in accomplishing them. Someone will always say, after talk of a district title or a playoff spot is through, “You play Thanksgiving Week, you are the real deal.” Or some such.

But to play beyond it, after the leftovers are gone and the world returns to work, that is something else. Only the class teams in the state play football in December. And in 2011, that means Harlingen…one of the best teams in the state. The state.

So as winding gobs of pink Silly String (!) jetted out of one honk-mobile on the ride out, and as the mob of vehicles edged closer to the turnoff for Highway 77 (Redbird Lane, tell me you saw it too, about a mile from the exit, was I hallucinating?) one got the feeling that unlike most teams in Valley history (and like Donna 1961, Weslaco 1955, P-SJ-A 62-63, PI four times, a few other gems), these Cards are not satisfied. They are not going to come into Friday’s showdown with Madison looking to “do their best.” Because you know, many times when that euphemism is employed, it’s PC code for “not get our asses kicked.”

No, this team is different. Loaded with talent, tons of heart, and a killer instinct like its leader. Its royal rooting troop does not want to cruise up to Kingsville for the latest road trip just to “compete.” We’ve all had it with “competing,” baby. Harlingen, the Valley, they’re ready. We ready.

To win again.

Put that in your paper, SA.

 

Tags: harlingen cardinals, san antonio warren