Yoe soccer drops close one to Rockdale

The Cameron Yoemen boy’s soccer team lost a heart-breaking game to the Rockdale Tigers on Friday via penalty kicks. 

The Yoemen started very stout on defense with a save within the first five minutes if the game by Adolfo Camacho (00). Cameron also had a strong offensive start as well with an early shot on goal that unfortunately was not successful. 

For most of the first half, the two teams traded several shots on goal. The Yoemen had a corner kick opportunity in the eleventh minute of the first half but sadly, they were unable to connect on the kick. Despite their bad luck, Cameron kept up the offensive pressure. 

Jesse Martinez (4) had an opportunity to score at the 20th minute and failed. Cameron avoided a scare in the 24th minute of the half, where Camacho saved a corner kick in spectacular fashion. Rockdale started to put more pressure late in the half but the Yoemen defense stood strong and kept the score for Rockdale at zero. Also, near the end of half, the Yoemen had a corner kick opportunity that just missed by hitting the top of the post at the 37th minute. The two teams would enter halftime with the score tied at zero. 

The Yoemen defense picked up where they left off in the first half as Camacho saved a goal early in the half. After that amazing save, Cameron started to push up the tempo. The Yoemen had a chance of scoring a goal at the 43rd and 48th minutes of the half. Camacho saved a huge free kick, then survived a corner kick shortly after. After those two saves there was some conflicts between some of the players as multiple skirmishes looked to possibly start, which the officials and security broke up almost immediately before it could escalate into anything serious. 

“It’s just a physical game,” Coach Jaryd Garza said. “I think what happened is that we had a little collision and they just got fired up and it wasn’t anything intentional or anything malicious, but it was just a physical game.” 

The Yoemen still tried to push the offensive tempo and take the lead before time ran out, however, their valiant effort was not successful. Cameron gave themselves several more opportunities to score but missed wide in the 68th minute, then another direct miss in the 72nd minute. This exciting defensive battle would end in a 0-0 tie. In the end, Camacho recorded 16 total saves and deserves lots of credit for his performance. 

“That was tough,” Garza said. “We try to get the ball in the box and put them in the most vulnerable position, and it’s tough for them to get it out. But we shot it, and it ricocheted, and it just didn’t go in tonight.” 

Due to some new rules this year, the game was still not over. In district games, if the game ends in a tie the game then goes to penalty kicks, so each team got five chances each. After five chances both teams successfully completed four of their five opportunities, which led to the next round of penalty kicks, where the first one to miss a goal (Cameron) and the other team gets a goal (Rockdale) wins. Camacho had given up the next goal, and it was now up to Iverson Braziel (3) to keep the Yoemen alive. He was unable to connect giving the victory to Rockdale.

 Garza was still pleased with his team’s performance. 

“It speaks volumes for the defense, the defense did great,” he said. “It also speaks volumes about our offense because in the second half we were just pulling the trigger. We were trying to shoot the ball, shoot the ball, shoot the ball and I thought that was great. We did everything we wanted to do, and we put the ball in positions we wanted it to be in, the ball just didn’t go through the net today.”

The boys also defeated Caldwell 1-0 on Tuesday night.