PHARR — The last time PSJA North and Corpus Christi Veterans shared the field, the Eagles’ ended the Raiders’ season with a six-point win in the 2022 Region IV-5A DI final.
The two locked horns again, this time as District 15-5A DI rivals and title contenders, and PSJA North dominated Corpus Christi Veterans from start to finish for a 35-7 victory Thursday at PSJA Stadium in Pharr.
The win is PSJA North’s 24th consecutive regular season victory as the Raiders improve 4-0 overall and 2-0 in district. Corpus Christi Veterans drops to 3-2 overall and 2-1 in 15-5A DI.
“This one had me nervous. That’s a really good football team,” PSJA North head coach Marcus Kaufmann said. “Their defensive coordinator, Coach (Wayne) Wilson, shut us down a couple years ago. We kind of had an idea of what they were going to do. They do such a great job of adjusting that we were worried, so we started out throwing it around a little bit, trying to get them off their game a little bit and it worked for a while. The kids did a good job of being able to get back-and-forth, in-and-out of the spread and into the power run game.”
The Raiders won the coin toss and elected to defer to the second half. PSJA North’s “Blackshirts Defense” set the tone right out of the gate by forcing Corpus Christi Veterans to punt on the opening drive.
The Raiders then hit pay-dirt offensively as running back Ethan Guerra exploded for a 37-yard touchdown on a draw on 3rd-and-9 to put PSJA North ahead 7-0 and they never looked back.
The Raiders put together long drives offensively that ended with touchdowns and smelled blood in the water defensively, forcing three first half turnovers on fumbles caused by linebacker Steven Garza and two by defensive back Bryan Guerrero. PSJA North recovered all three to take the wind out of Corpus Christi Veterans’ sails early.
“We were creating turnovers and getting the ball back to the O. Defense wins championships and we were doing what we gotta do,” Garza said.
“These kids play like that all the time when we let them. Sometimes we’re in games where we have to pull them out of games, but we let them loose today and they looked like they were hungry to hit people and keep on hitting people. They did a great job tonight and we had that team flinching a lot tonight,” Kaufmann said.
PSJA North’s junior back Guerra finished with 204 total yards and two touchdowns on 21 touches to lead the Raiders’ offense. Quarterback Daren Garcia ran for an 8-yard touchdown and threw a 7-yard pass to receiver Nick Torres for six. Torres also added a rushing touchdown as the receiver took an end around the left edge for a 15-yard score to go up 35-0 midway through the fourth quarter.
“I told my boys I really wanted this revenge,” Guerra said, referencing PSJA North’s 2022 fourth-round playoff matchup against Corpus Christi Veterans. “We practiced hard every morning to get stuff straight. We had to come out here and ball out.”
PSJA North kept Corpus Christi Veterans off the scoreboard until the waning minutes as running back Andrew Charlebois punched in a 1-yard touchdown late in the fourth. The Raiders held the Eagles to 174 yards of total offense.
Next for PSJA North is a matchup with Harlingen South (2-2, 1-1) at 7:30 p.m. next Friday at Boggus Stadium in Harlingen.
Corpus Christi Veterans enters its bye week in Week 6. The Eagles return to play against Harlingen South on Oct. 11 in Corpus Christi.
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