The Sealy Tiger soccer team found the end of the road in the Area Championship after a 5-1 loss to Waco La Vega last Tuesday. With the end of the season also came the release of all-district awards and the runner-up Tigers earned multiple selections.

Junior Amador Lopez was named the district’s offensive player of the year after he finished with 12 goals and nine assists. He was joined by six teammates who were named to all-district teams as well as three more honorable mentions.

Senior Carlos Angueven and junior Tanner Ellis represented the Tigers on the first-team all-district and seniors Brayan Aviles, Oswaldo Rodriguez and Jose Guerrero, as well as junior Rodolfo Olivarez, were all named to the second-team all-district. Seniors Xavier Olvera and Julius Aguilar, as well as sophomore Maximino Requena, all garnered all-district honorable mentions.

Although a majority of the all-district honorees are members of the Class of 2022, Lopez will return to lead the team once again next year.

“He’s part of the football program so I spent a lot of time with him there as well but it just felt like when soccer season kicked on, you can just see a little bit of a growth and maturity with that young man in terms of him stepping up into a leadership role,” Head Coach Joshua Kirton said Saturday. “Even though we had captain armbands and everything, it didn’t matter if he had one or not; he still was a leader. From the way he practiced, his work ethic, to the things he said; he was always inspirational to his teammates and encouraging them.”

Kirton knows, however, that this senior class laid the foundation for success with their three playoff wins last year and has set the standard.

“I had my broad, overall message after the game and then I pulled the seniors aside after that and even though I’ve only been here for a year, I watched them last year and I just thanked them for being leaders on this team for helping get the younger guys in line,” Kirton said. “I thanked them for the commitment to the program and thanked them for coming out and playing and giving it their all for us and just showing the younger guys a good example of what hard work can do for you.”

On the other side of the coin, with a contingency of underclassmen Tigers returning, Kirton said some of them were able to knock off the nerves early.

“We had some freshmen play and early on in the season, you put them out there and it’s kind of like a deer in the headlights because they go from playing junior high and next thing you know, they’re playing varsity which is a big jump in level of play,” Kirton said. “We also have some kids that are in eighth grade coming up next year that we have our eye on so we’re going to have a good mixture of kids that have been in the program for a few years and some kids that are new bloods, if you will.”

Another key piece to next year’s puzzle will be a junior who was possibly snubbed from all-district honors: William Forrester.

“He didn’t make an all-district team but I wanted to give Big Willy a shoutout because he’s another great kid who worked his tail off,” Kirton said. “We like to call him ‘The Terminator,’ because he’s so big and strong and sometimes when you hit him it’s like hitting the wall.”

At the end of the day, the head coach wanted his players to not struggle over the small things or stress about the second-round loss but instead appreciate the overall goals the team achieved.

“We have to look at the bigger picture of how everything unfolded. We can’t just look under the microscope at one game and have that be the accumulation of what our season was,” Kirton said. “We had a lot of positives, we had a lot of adversity we had to battle all year and all these kids did was just go to war, go to battle and just keep working and doing all the little things right.”