The Independence Varsity Football team faced a great amount of hardships as well as many exhilarating moments during their ‘24 season.
They started the season off with an opening game against Kellis.
They faced some adversity during this game as Kellis was a very good team as a whole. Head Coach Shane Hagen explains how it was more difficult because it was “week one” and “no film on Kellis to look at.” This caused the patriots to come short of a win this game.
However, as the season went on they began to develop more team chemistry and work out their flaws in order to start playing their best ball out on the field. Senior Quincy Ortega Starks mentioned that they built their team chemistry by “hanging out with each other outside of football” in order to get comfortable with one another.
As their season progressed they faced many challenges against many teams; nevertheless, they continued to persevere and win many games. Their biggest win out of the season was when they beat Glendale 33-28.
As well as their huge win against La Joya towards the end of the season when they beat them 47-0.
Starks said his favorite memory from this past season was beating Glendale and “winning the cup back from them.”
Although, Senior Wide Receiver Adrian Navarro mentioned that as their season progressed the players began to get divided amongst themselves. That due to this division in the team it affected their play and caused them to not have a very good ending to their season.
The Patriots ended their season with a record of 6-4.
These difficulties only give more room and opportunity for growth for the upcoming season next school year.
Hagen says this new season will be difficult because “we are losing a lot of seniors that have set the foundation of the program,” but nevertheless “there are great sophomores and juniors coming up who will have new opportunities.”
This makes the new upcoming season very anticipated to the players as well as their fellow patriots in the school.
They are looking forward to hopefully improving their play and win as many games as they can and the entire school of Independence is rooting them on.
