Post by TEAM FALCON on Aug 11, 2006 21:57:22 GMT 3
Falcons broke new ground in Valley
August 09,2006
Oscar Gonzalez Jr.
Monitor Sports Editor
LOS FRESNOS — If there’s one thing to be said of the Los Fresnos Falcons, it’s that they were first in flight.
Los Fresnos may have adopted their mascot decades before living up to its namesake, but the Falcons eventually were able to soar to new heights in the 1960s after adopting the run-and-shoot offense — becoming the first team believed to have taken the offensive philosophy in the Rio Grande Valley.
It seems that ever since then-coach Jerry Tomsu and his gang fell upon a book on the run-and-shoot offense, the Falcons have made it their trademark and embarked on some success chucking the pigskin through the air.
The Falcons, from their early beginnings in 1934 to the early 1970s, had some sensational seasons.
But soon after one player, Leo Aguilar, suffered a debilitating injury during football practice and later died from complications directly related to the injury, Los Fresnos football was nearly non-existent. Instead of passing their way past opponents, the Falcons became the Homecoming fodder for opposing teams.
From 1972 to 1994, Falcon football was about as harmless as a hatchling. But, during the mid-1990s, guided by two former players, Los Fresnos began to join the ranks of venerable deep South Texas football clubs.
IN THE BEGINNING
1934-1971
The Falcons began their program in 1934 as one of the Valley’s six-man football teams. Los Fresnos recorded victories over Rio Grande City, San Benito Junior High and El Jardin, and lost to Stuart Place, 14-12.
Through the next six seasons, the Falcons would take the field as a six-man team, albeit unofficially. It wasn’t until 1939 that officials from Santa Rosa, El Jardin, Sharyland, San Perlita and Stuart Place met to organize the first official Valley six-man district according to UIL rules and regulations.
In 1939, officially kicking off as a full-fledged member of the UIL, Los Fresnos took their first snap on Sept. 15, 1939 against Stuart Place. Their maiden voyage into the regulated six-man league didn’t fare well for the Falcons, losing to the Harlingen-area school 14-6.
But it was a beginning nonetheless.
In 1940, the Falcons proved they could hang with the boys, winning the district six-man title. Los Fresnos beat St. Joseph (13-6), Stuart Place (8-7), Santa Rosa (25-12) and El Jardin twice (52-0 and 16-8).
In 1941, Los Fresnos again won the six-man district, but was defeated by Ben Bolt in the bi-district round of the playoffs 48-46.
Results and statistics from seasons in 1942 through ’44 were scarce or unavailable.
In 1945, the Falcons returned to the top of the six-man district, defeating Santa Rosa for the district title.
It wasn’t until 1946, however, that Los Fresnos is listed with having won their first playoff game. The Falcons, after winning the six-man district with a 7-0 record, crushed Pawnee 45-26 in a playoff game played at Tucker Field in Brownsville. No other playoff game is reported that year.
The Falcons again won the six-man Valley title in 1947, but dropped their playoff game against Smiley, 25-12.
For the third-straight season, 1948, the Falcons record another district title, going 8-0 in the regular season. But for the second-straight year, Los Fresnos was defeated in the postseason, this time losing to Yancy 30-12.
Los Fresnos didn’t win a game in 1949 (0-4), and midway through the century, in 1950, the Falcons upped their classification from six-man to 11-man football where they finished 3-6-1 overall.
Two of those victories in ’50 — a 27-0 spanking and a close 8-6 victory over Port Isabel — likely sparked the rivalry that is known today as the Battle of Highway 100. Los Fresnos’ 8-6 victory won them the right to claim the two-team District 36-B title over the Tarpons.
In fact, the two teams have battled each season since then at least once. Los Fresnos holds the all-time series against Port Isabel, winning 31 games, losing 26 and tying once in 1952 (6-6).
Sadly, 2006 marks the end of a 56-year streak between the two clubs. After bumping up to Class 5A in 2004, the talent pool between the two schools has grown apart. Port Isabel’s last victory over Los Fresnos came in 1995, and the Falcons have claimed a victory in every season since for the exception of the 2003 season when the game was called off because of heavy rain.
Although Los Fresnos had bumped up in classification in 1950, they weren’t contenders until 1955, when they went 7-1-1 overall — the very first season every original six-man team competed as an 11-man football team. The Falcons lost the district title in a three-way tie with Rio Hondo and Lyford. The championship went to Rio Hondo, but Falcon football as it is known today was born.
Los Fresnos went 6-3 in 1956 and won the District 36-B title. They advanced to the playoffs, but tied with Bishop 7-7 and the Badgers advanced by virtue of a 2-1 advantage on penetrations.
Los Fresnos again claims the title, this time in District 32-2A in 1957 with a 7-1 record, but is quickly dispatched again by Bishop, 20-0, in a bi-district playoff.
Things spiraled a bit for the Falcons. The 1958 campaign was called after a 2-1 start because of a lack of players. The Falcons then went 3-6-1 in 1959 in their first full season since 1957.
Los Fresnos had some moderate success in the early 1960s, posting back-to-back 5-5 marks in the first two years of the decade, including a 20-12 loss to eventual state champion Donna in 1961.
Los Fresnos had good seasons in ’62 and ’63, going 7-2-1 and 8-2, respectively before embarking on one of the most successful eras in the schools’ history.
In 1964, the Falcons went 9-1 overall, and tied with Edcouch-Elsa and La Feria for the 32-2A title. But in a scene straight from the book and feature film Friday Night Lights, the district champion, and playoff representative was determined by a coin toss.
"We did go a long way and it strictly was on a coin toss," then quarterback and former head coach Leonel Garza said, "and we didn’t lose a coin toss all year.
"We should have taken him (the superintendent) to Vegas."
The Falcons won the flip, then went three-round deep in the postseason. The Falcons defeated Freer 27-26 in the opener, then Bishop 7-0 before meeting up against Palacios in the state quarterfinal round.
Palacios handed it to Los Fresnos, 32-6, but the winds of change had blown through Los Fresnos.
Those winds, however, had paused for one season, before resuming again in 1966.
In 1965, the Falcons went 5-5, but the promise of the new season seemed to echo that of the 64 team. Los Fresnos began the year at 5-0, and seemed ready to replicate their success from a year earlier.
"We started off 5-0 as freshmen, scored 168 points and gave up a total of 8, and one was a safety," Garza recalled. "I thought we were doing better than the quarterfinal team and we might do better. And then the second half, the bottom fell out and there was nothing we could hold on to."
"I vowed to myself that I wouldn’t be the focus of failure," Garza said.
Garza may not have been happy, but the season brought forth a brand of football alien to the Rio Grande Valley — the run-and-shoot.
Then-assistant coach Jerry Tomsu brought a philosophy he adopted during their time in Corpus Christi. Author Glenn "Tiger" Ellison wrote a book that used a one-running back set, with receivers spread across the field known as the run-and-shoot.
After Garza’s freshman campaign, in 1965, Earl Gartman’s last year as head coach of the Falcons, Tomsu went with the run-and-shoot offense.
"The summer before, working out during the summer, and from that day I learned to throw a football with my right arm and left my arm," Garza said.
Whichever arm he used, Garza fared well going through the air during his high school career. Garza passed for more than 2,100 career passing yards while at Los Fresnos.
Though Garza vowed to be a winner, as it turned out, 1966 wasn’t exactly a stellar campaign, at least not on the win-loss column. The Falcons went 4-5-1, but managed to win the games that counted, posting a 4-1 district 32-2A record, and held the tie-breaker against Lyford when it came down to determine the district champ.
Los Fresnos lost to Freer in the bi-district round, 20-14.
In Garza’s final season, 1967, the Falcons went 7-2 overall, won the 32-2A title, and returned to the playoffs again. But after beating Freer in a 34-20 shootout, San Antonio Randolph ended the Falcons season with a 56-0 blowout.
"I ran the run-and-shoot through 31 years of coaching and never deviated from it," Garza said. "I was the guinea pig in 1965, but hey, it’s kept my belly full, let’s just put it that way."
After Garza’s departure, another future Falcons coach was along for a few winning seasons, although they didn’t generate playoff appearances.
Jesus Amaya and the graduating class of 1971 posted 5-6, 6-4 and 7-2 overall records from 1968-70. But what happened in the fall of ’70 changed the course of the Falcons’ football history, at least in Amaya’s eyes.
On a Tuesday afternoon, during football practice, a running back named Leo Aguilar broke across the middle of the defensive line "and tried to get a little bit more," out of the play, Amaya said.
During that moment when Aguilar didn’t quit on the play, he took a hit to the head and fell as quickly as he was hit.
"Right away he was paralyzed," Amaya said. "His teammates were watching him for 40 minutes, struggling to breathe, waiting for an ambulance."
Aguilar eventually was taken to a hospital in Brownsville where he stayed until his death days later. Amaya constantly visited Aguilar, who couldn’t speak because of a tracheal tube. One Friday, while his friends had stopped by and minus a tracheal tube, Aguilar told them to "go out and have a good time."
The next day, Aguilar died of complications from the injury. In his honor, the football stadium in Los Fresnos was named Leo Aguilar Stadium.
"You talk about growing up, being a pall bearer for your buddy’s funeral, … " Amaya said. "It was such a blow to the community."
Amaya said it also hit the football team hard on participation. First-generation football families wanted to pull players from the program because of the risk of death, Amaya said.
"I guarantee you it went on for a year. They almost didn’t have enough people to have a junior high program," Amaya said. "It took a long time, football-wise, to get over that."
If the Falcons’ success was in any way directly attributed to Aguilar’s death, it then took decades to return to normal. At least it may have been the case after the 1971 season.
The Falcons went 10-0 that year, winning the 32-2A title, but were defeated by Premont 15-14 in Premont in a game that Falcons fans would likely say was controversial.
There was a dispute during the playoff game when a fight broke out on the field with Los Fresnos hanging on to a 14-12 lead. During the fracas, a Premont policeman reportedly maced seven Los Fresnos starters, who "fell to the ground screaming and holding their eyes," according to a Time magazine account.
The magazine went on to state that Premont completed a 55-yard pass after the incident, and kicked a field goal to win the game. Premont later sent Los Fresnos "a bill for $1,200 for the damage that the angry losers caused when they tried to tear up the locker room," the magazine went on to read.
THE MIDDLE AGES
1972-1994
If there were dark ages for Los Fresnos, it was the time between the early ’70s and mid-’90s.
The Falcons won 87 games in that span, losing 152 and tying four games. They finished better than a .500 mark six times in that span, including two back-to-back 8-2 seasons in 1978-79, but did not make the playoffs in a time when only one team advanced to the postseason.
"They couldn’t beat their way out of a paper bag," Garza recalled of those teams in that span.
But in the mid-1990s, after Amaya’s five-year span as a head coach saw just one losing season, the Falcons were back.
Amaya opened the 1991 and ’92 seasons with 5-5 records before having a 3-7 year in 1993. In 1994, the Falcons finished 6-4 and set the tone for the next year.
MODERN TIMES
1995-Present
In Amaya’s final year at the helm, the Falcons returned to the playoffs for the first time since 1971.
The Falcons went 8-2 overall, but lost to Corpus Christi Calallen 62-20 in a bi-district playoff game. But it was a season that started a run through today.
Then, it was time for Amaya’s former teammate to take charge.
"Jesus Amaya hired me to help coach Los Fresnos and I was back in coaching," Garza said. "We kind of turned back around and things were going real well in Los Fresnos."
In 1996, the Falcons went 8-1 and lost to Alice 34-13 in a Division I, bi-district playoff.
In 1997, the Falcons recorded their first playoff victory in 30 years with a 21-20 overtime win over Alice. It was the first victory since Garza himself quarterbacked for the Falcons.
The Falcons trailed the game 20-14 in overtime, and faced a fourth-and-goal at the Alice 1-yard line when fullback Luke Moses took the handoff over the left side for the touchdown.
Arturo Hernandez booted the extra point for the 21-20 victory.
"We won it on the field," Garza told The Monitor after the game. "It was no fluke."
Los Fresnos then chalked up an 8-2 record in 1998, but again lost to Alice in the opening playoff round, 32-0.
Three more lean years followed from 1999-2001, with records of 7-3, 5-5 and 4-6 before Los Fresnos returned to the ranks of the unbeaten. The Falcons then went 10-0 in 2002, defeating PSJA Memorial 35-28 in bi-district before being eliminated by Gregory-Portland 33-7 in the area round.
The Falcons went 5-4 in 2003, their final year in Class 4A. In 2004, the Falcons bumped up to the highest classification in Texas, and finished 4-6.
In 2005, the Falcons bounced back with an 8-2 record, and were once ranked as the Valley’s top team by The Monitor. The Falcons won their first playoff game as a 5A school, a 44-41 overtime victory over Weslaco High, before being ousted by Laredo United 29-24.
Update:
District Champions,
2006(10-0,12-1)-Regional Semifinals
2008(10-0,12-1)-Regional Semifinals
2007(10-3)-Regional Semifinals
Bi-District Champions:
2008 LF 70 EdinNorth 21,
2007 LF 22 Harlingen 21 OT
,2006 LF 45 PSJA 38
Area Champions:
2008
2007
2006
August 09,2006
Oscar Gonzalez Jr.
Monitor Sports Editor
LOS FRESNOS — If there’s one thing to be said of the Los Fresnos Falcons, it’s that they were first in flight.
Los Fresnos may have adopted their mascot decades before living up to its namesake, but the Falcons eventually were able to soar to new heights in the 1960s after adopting the run-and-shoot offense — becoming the first team believed to have taken the offensive philosophy in the Rio Grande Valley.
It seems that ever since then-coach Jerry Tomsu and his gang fell upon a book on the run-and-shoot offense, the Falcons have made it their trademark and embarked on some success chucking the pigskin through the air.
The Falcons, from their early beginnings in 1934 to the early 1970s, had some sensational seasons.
But soon after one player, Leo Aguilar, suffered a debilitating injury during football practice and later died from complications directly related to the injury, Los Fresnos football was nearly non-existent. Instead of passing their way past opponents, the Falcons became the Homecoming fodder for opposing teams.
From 1972 to 1994, Falcon football was about as harmless as a hatchling. But, during the mid-1990s, guided by two former players, Los Fresnos began to join the ranks of venerable deep South Texas football clubs.
IN THE BEGINNING
1934-1971
The Falcons began their program in 1934 as one of the Valley’s six-man football teams. Los Fresnos recorded victories over Rio Grande City, San Benito Junior High and El Jardin, and lost to Stuart Place, 14-12.
Through the next six seasons, the Falcons would take the field as a six-man team, albeit unofficially. It wasn’t until 1939 that officials from Santa Rosa, El Jardin, Sharyland, San Perlita and Stuart Place met to organize the first official Valley six-man district according to UIL rules and regulations.
In 1939, officially kicking off as a full-fledged member of the UIL, Los Fresnos took their first snap on Sept. 15, 1939 against Stuart Place. Their maiden voyage into the regulated six-man league didn’t fare well for the Falcons, losing to the Harlingen-area school 14-6.
But it was a beginning nonetheless.
In 1940, the Falcons proved they could hang with the boys, winning the district six-man title. Los Fresnos beat St. Joseph (13-6), Stuart Place (8-7), Santa Rosa (25-12) and El Jardin twice (52-0 and 16-8).
In 1941, Los Fresnos again won the six-man district, but was defeated by Ben Bolt in the bi-district round of the playoffs 48-46.
Results and statistics from seasons in 1942 through ’44 were scarce or unavailable.
In 1945, the Falcons returned to the top of the six-man district, defeating Santa Rosa for the district title.
It wasn’t until 1946, however, that Los Fresnos is listed with having won their first playoff game. The Falcons, after winning the six-man district with a 7-0 record, crushed Pawnee 45-26 in a playoff game played at Tucker Field in Brownsville. No other playoff game is reported that year.
The Falcons again won the six-man Valley title in 1947, but dropped their playoff game against Smiley, 25-12.
For the third-straight season, 1948, the Falcons record another district title, going 8-0 in the regular season. But for the second-straight year, Los Fresnos was defeated in the postseason, this time losing to Yancy 30-12.
Los Fresnos didn’t win a game in 1949 (0-4), and midway through the century, in 1950, the Falcons upped their classification from six-man to 11-man football where they finished 3-6-1 overall.
Two of those victories in ’50 — a 27-0 spanking and a close 8-6 victory over Port Isabel — likely sparked the rivalry that is known today as the Battle of Highway 100. Los Fresnos’ 8-6 victory won them the right to claim the two-team District 36-B title over the Tarpons.
In fact, the two teams have battled each season since then at least once. Los Fresnos holds the all-time series against Port Isabel, winning 31 games, losing 26 and tying once in 1952 (6-6).
Sadly, 2006 marks the end of a 56-year streak between the two clubs. After bumping up to Class 5A in 2004, the talent pool between the two schools has grown apart. Port Isabel’s last victory over Los Fresnos came in 1995, and the Falcons have claimed a victory in every season since for the exception of the 2003 season when the game was called off because of heavy rain.
Although Los Fresnos had bumped up in classification in 1950, they weren’t contenders until 1955, when they went 7-1-1 overall — the very first season every original six-man team competed as an 11-man football team. The Falcons lost the district title in a three-way tie with Rio Hondo and Lyford. The championship went to Rio Hondo, but Falcon football as it is known today was born.
Los Fresnos went 6-3 in 1956 and won the District 36-B title. They advanced to the playoffs, but tied with Bishop 7-7 and the Badgers advanced by virtue of a 2-1 advantage on penetrations.
Los Fresnos again claims the title, this time in District 32-2A in 1957 with a 7-1 record, but is quickly dispatched again by Bishop, 20-0, in a bi-district playoff.
Things spiraled a bit for the Falcons. The 1958 campaign was called after a 2-1 start because of a lack of players. The Falcons then went 3-6-1 in 1959 in their first full season since 1957.
Los Fresnos had some moderate success in the early 1960s, posting back-to-back 5-5 marks in the first two years of the decade, including a 20-12 loss to eventual state champion Donna in 1961.
Los Fresnos had good seasons in ’62 and ’63, going 7-2-1 and 8-2, respectively before embarking on one of the most successful eras in the schools’ history.
In 1964, the Falcons went 9-1 overall, and tied with Edcouch-Elsa and La Feria for the 32-2A title. But in a scene straight from the book and feature film Friday Night Lights, the district champion, and playoff representative was determined by a coin toss.
"We did go a long way and it strictly was on a coin toss," then quarterback and former head coach Leonel Garza said, "and we didn’t lose a coin toss all year.
"We should have taken him (the superintendent) to Vegas."
The Falcons won the flip, then went three-round deep in the postseason. The Falcons defeated Freer 27-26 in the opener, then Bishop 7-0 before meeting up against Palacios in the state quarterfinal round.
Palacios handed it to Los Fresnos, 32-6, but the winds of change had blown through Los Fresnos.
Those winds, however, had paused for one season, before resuming again in 1966.
In 1965, the Falcons went 5-5, but the promise of the new season seemed to echo that of the 64 team. Los Fresnos began the year at 5-0, and seemed ready to replicate their success from a year earlier.
"We started off 5-0 as freshmen, scored 168 points and gave up a total of 8, and one was a safety," Garza recalled. "I thought we were doing better than the quarterfinal team and we might do better. And then the second half, the bottom fell out and there was nothing we could hold on to."
"I vowed to myself that I wouldn’t be the focus of failure," Garza said.
Garza may not have been happy, but the season brought forth a brand of football alien to the Rio Grande Valley — the run-and-shoot.
Then-assistant coach Jerry Tomsu brought a philosophy he adopted during their time in Corpus Christi. Author Glenn "Tiger" Ellison wrote a book that used a one-running back set, with receivers spread across the field known as the run-and-shoot.
After Garza’s freshman campaign, in 1965, Earl Gartman’s last year as head coach of the Falcons, Tomsu went with the run-and-shoot offense.
"The summer before, working out during the summer, and from that day I learned to throw a football with my right arm and left my arm," Garza said.
Whichever arm he used, Garza fared well going through the air during his high school career. Garza passed for more than 2,100 career passing yards while at Los Fresnos.
Though Garza vowed to be a winner, as it turned out, 1966 wasn’t exactly a stellar campaign, at least not on the win-loss column. The Falcons went 4-5-1, but managed to win the games that counted, posting a 4-1 district 32-2A record, and held the tie-breaker against Lyford when it came down to determine the district champ.
Los Fresnos lost to Freer in the bi-district round, 20-14.
In Garza’s final season, 1967, the Falcons went 7-2 overall, won the 32-2A title, and returned to the playoffs again. But after beating Freer in a 34-20 shootout, San Antonio Randolph ended the Falcons season with a 56-0 blowout.
"I ran the run-and-shoot through 31 years of coaching and never deviated from it," Garza said. "I was the guinea pig in 1965, but hey, it’s kept my belly full, let’s just put it that way."
After Garza’s departure, another future Falcons coach was along for a few winning seasons, although they didn’t generate playoff appearances.
Jesus Amaya and the graduating class of 1971 posted 5-6, 6-4 and 7-2 overall records from 1968-70. But what happened in the fall of ’70 changed the course of the Falcons’ football history, at least in Amaya’s eyes.
On a Tuesday afternoon, during football practice, a running back named Leo Aguilar broke across the middle of the defensive line "and tried to get a little bit more," out of the play, Amaya said.
During that moment when Aguilar didn’t quit on the play, he took a hit to the head and fell as quickly as he was hit.
"Right away he was paralyzed," Amaya said. "His teammates were watching him for 40 minutes, struggling to breathe, waiting for an ambulance."
Aguilar eventually was taken to a hospital in Brownsville where he stayed until his death days later. Amaya constantly visited Aguilar, who couldn’t speak because of a tracheal tube. One Friday, while his friends had stopped by and minus a tracheal tube, Aguilar told them to "go out and have a good time."
The next day, Aguilar died of complications from the injury. In his honor, the football stadium in Los Fresnos was named Leo Aguilar Stadium.
"You talk about growing up, being a pall bearer for your buddy’s funeral, … " Amaya said. "It was such a blow to the community."
Amaya said it also hit the football team hard on participation. First-generation football families wanted to pull players from the program because of the risk of death, Amaya said.
"I guarantee you it went on for a year. They almost didn’t have enough people to have a junior high program," Amaya said. "It took a long time, football-wise, to get over that."
If the Falcons’ success was in any way directly attributed to Aguilar’s death, it then took decades to return to normal. At least it may have been the case after the 1971 season.
The Falcons went 10-0 that year, winning the 32-2A title, but were defeated by Premont 15-14 in Premont in a game that Falcons fans would likely say was controversial.
There was a dispute during the playoff game when a fight broke out on the field with Los Fresnos hanging on to a 14-12 lead. During the fracas, a Premont policeman reportedly maced seven Los Fresnos starters, who "fell to the ground screaming and holding their eyes," according to a Time magazine account.
The magazine went on to state that Premont completed a 55-yard pass after the incident, and kicked a field goal to win the game. Premont later sent Los Fresnos "a bill for $1,200 for the damage that the angry losers caused when they tried to tear up the locker room," the magazine went on to read.
THE MIDDLE AGES
1972-1994
If there were dark ages for Los Fresnos, it was the time between the early ’70s and mid-’90s.
The Falcons won 87 games in that span, losing 152 and tying four games. They finished better than a .500 mark six times in that span, including two back-to-back 8-2 seasons in 1978-79, but did not make the playoffs in a time when only one team advanced to the postseason.
"They couldn’t beat their way out of a paper bag," Garza recalled of those teams in that span.
But in the mid-1990s, after Amaya’s five-year span as a head coach saw just one losing season, the Falcons were back.
Amaya opened the 1991 and ’92 seasons with 5-5 records before having a 3-7 year in 1993. In 1994, the Falcons finished 6-4 and set the tone for the next year.
MODERN TIMES
1995-Present
In Amaya’s final year at the helm, the Falcons returned to the playoffs for the first time since 1971.
The Falcons went 8-2 overall, but lost to Corpus Christi Calallen 62-20 in a bi-district playoff game. But it was a season that started a run through today.
Then, it was time for Amaya’s former teammate to take charge.
"Jesus Amaya hired me to help coach Los Fresnos and I was back in coaching," Garza said. "We kind of turned back around and things were going real well in Los Fresnos."
In 1996, the Falcons went 8-1 and lost to Alice 34-13 in a Division I, bi-district playoff.
In 1997, the Falcons recorded their first playoff victory in 30 years with a 21-20 overtime win over Alice. It was the first victory since Garza himself quarterbacked for the Falcons.
The Falcons trailed the game 20-14 in overtime, and faced a fourth-and-goal at the Alice 1-yard line when fullback Luke Moses took the handoff over the left side for the touchdown.
Arturo Hernandez booted the extra point for the 21-20 victory.
"We won it on the field," Garza told The Monitor after the game. "It was no fluke."
Los Fresnos then chalked up an 8-2 record in 1998, but again lost to Alice in the opening playoff round, 32-0.
Three more lean years followed from 1999-2001, with records of 7-3, 5-5 and 4-6 before Los Fresnos returned to the ranks of the unbeaten. The Falcons then went 10-0 in 2002, defeating PSJA Memorial 35-28 in bi-district before being eliminated by Gregory-Portland 33-7 in the area round.
The Falcons went 5-4 in 2003, their final year in Class 4A. In 2004, the Falcons bumped up to the highest classification in Texas, and finished 4-6.
In 2005, the Falcons bounced back with an 8-2 record, and were once ranked as the Valley’s top team by The Monitor. The Falcons won their first playoff game as a 5A school, a 44-41 overtime victory over Weslaco High, before being ousted by Laredo United 29-24.
Update:
District Champions,
2006(10-0,12-1)-Regional Semifinals
2008(10-0,12-1)-Regional Semifinals
2007(10-3)-Regional Semifinals
Bi-District Champions:
2008 LF 70 EdinNorth 21,
2007 LF 22 Harlingen 21 OT
,2006 LF 45 PSJA 38
Area Champions:
2008
2007
2006