Football Preview: Pace Vikings vs. Mercedes Tigers
Pace hasn't had much luck against Mercedes recently, but that could start to change on Friday. The Pace Vikings will challenge the Mercedes Tigers at 7:00 p.m. Hopefully Pace focused on turnovers this week as the team gave up seven last Thursday.
Pace will head out to face Mercedes after giving up their first home loss of the season last Thursday. Pace fell just short of Lopez by a score of 24-21. The match marked the Vikings' lowest-scoring matchup so far this season.
Pace might have lost, but man, Adrian Sauceda was a machine: he rushed for 299 yards and three touchdowns while picking up 12.0 yards per carry. Those 299 rushing yards gave Sauceda a new career-high.
Even though they lost, Pace was unstoppable on the ground and finished the game with 363 rushing yards. That strong performance was nothing new for the team: they've now rushed for at least 230 rushing yards in nine consecutive contests.
Pace wouldn't let Lopez keep a hold of the ball as they managed to force two fumbles. Pace can thank Ignacio Ramirez and Jesus Caballero for forcing both of them. Caballero is also on a roll when it comes to total tackles, as he's now made seven or more in the last seven games he's played. Pace got some further help from Narciso Rodriguez: he made 16 total tackles (2.0 for loss).
Meanwhile, winning is always nice, but doing so behind a season-high score is even better (just ask Mercedes). They breezed by Porter to the tune of 56-13 on Saturday. The Tigers might be getting used to big wins seeing as the team has won four games by 21 points or more this season.
Robert Sanchez continued his habit of posting crazy stat lines, rushing for 118 yards and three touchdowns on only six carries. His longest rush was for an impressive 57 yards, which helps to explain his lofty yards per carry total. Another big playmaker for Mercedes was Frank Gonzalez, who returned a punt for a touchdown.
The win (which was Mercedes' third in a row) raised their record to 6-3. Those good results were due in large part to their offensive performance across that stretch, as they averaged 45.7 points per game. As for Pace, their defeat ended a three-game streak of wins at home and dropped them to 6-3.
Friday's match will pit two of the most dominant backs against one another: Sauceda and Sanchez. Sauceda just won't slow down this season and has averaged 13.7 receiving yards per game. Sanchez has been a dominant force too and has run in 18 touchdowns while averaging 137.2 rushing yards per game.
Pace was taken down by Mercedes 61-21 in their previous meeting back in October of 2017. Thankfully for Pace, Marc Ledesma (who threw for 298 yards and two touchdowns on only 12 passes, and also rushed for 52 yards and two touchdowns) won't be suiting up this time. Will that be enough to change the final result? There's only one way to find out.
Article generated by infoSentience based on data entered on MaxPreps
