With a 5-0 win over Smithville in last Friday’s Bi-District Championship at Columbus Memorial Stadium, the Sealy Lady Tigers collected their first playoff win since 2016 and shattered another one of the team’s preseason goals.

“We’re taking those goals and we’re just beating them every time,” Sealy Head Coach Sydney Jones said Sunday. “That was one of the things we’re going to talk about on Monday is, ‘You beat Bellville, that was goal number one. Now you made it through the first round of playoffs, that was goal number two. So, what is it that we want out of this next game? What is our goal here, how far are we trying to go? What effort are we trying to put in here?’”

The Lady Tigers were set to answer those questions earlier this week when they traveled to Hutto to face the Burnet Bulldogs Tuesday evening in the Area Championship.

“I think we all, in our head, had that China Spring was gonna take that game and that’s who we were going up against,” Jones said. “I was looking at their games earlier, they came out of their district third and you really can’t underestimate those third or fourth place teams because sometimes they are surprising. I was looking at what their district scores looked like and I think they really have a tough district because when they came up against the first and second place teams, both teams scored so it wasn’t like a complete shutout or anything.”

Even after Friday’s win and celebration, Jones saw the excitement growing in her players in the postgame meal at Schobels.

“The best part, I think, was that we were sitting there and everybody else’s scores are starting to come in and the stats are starting to show up and they’re so into it at this point,” Jones said. “They’re like, ‘So and so lost, and so and so won,’ they were still in soccer mode, but they were laughing and they were having a really good time.”

The head coach hoped those good vibes carried over into this week as this Sealy squad embarks into uncharted territory.

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