Lake Highlands men’s soccer vanquished Richardson, 6-1, on Thursday at home.
Lake Highlands men’s soccer stands for the national anthem ahead of its game against Richardson Pearce on February 17, 2026, at Wildcat-Ram Stadium. Photo by Mike Duhon.
The Wildcats weren’t phased by the schedule change that moved the match up from Friday night, delivering a strong performance to down the Eagles (2-11-7, 0-9-4 District 7-6A). With the win, Lake Highlands (12-4-6, 7-2-4) gets back on the right track after floundering against Irving Nimitz on Tuesday.
Facing an early 1-0 deficit, the Wildcats’ offense seemed to stall. That was, until Brody Scott booted the ball ahead to Ivan Martinez on the left side of the field. Martinez subsequently delivered a missile straight into the top right corner of the net.
With 9:11 left until the close of the first half, the score was leveled. Just over five minutes of game time later, Scott made his impact felt again.
This time, Scott lined up for a free kick from the left hash of the 11-yard line following a yellow card against Richardson. The Eagles walled up to prevent a score, but Scott zipped the ball right by them to put Lake Highlands on top, 2-1, with 4:02 left in the first.
The Wildcats held strong through the final four minutes and took their lead into halftime. Lake Highlands spared no time coming out of the break.
“Their confidence in themselves is to be able to deal with adversities and going down a goal is an adversity,” Wildcats coach Tim Guinnee said. “It’s a long game; they stuck with it, they didn’t go away from the game plan.”
With just under two minutes having gone by in the second half, Martinez found the ball in scoring territory once again. He delivered and Lake Highlands took control of the momentum with a 3-1 advantage.
Scott only needed three-and-a-half minutes to match Martinez’s two goals on the evening. For his second score, Scott snuck around the Richardson defense to clean up a missed shot and extend the lead with 34:35 remaining in the contest.
“(Martinez and Scott) are very special players,” Guinnee said. “Ivan’s a senior, so we’ll definitely miss him next year. They let their play speak for themselves, so they don’t have to worry about talking much. They’re the leaders that get out and do it first.”
The Wildcats proceeded to clean up another miss roughly nine minutes later. In a wild scrum in front of the net, the ball found the goal. There were many players around the ball, but according to the PA announcer, Tray Willis was the one to record the score off an assist from Luke Beirute.
Grant Volkmer provided the final nail in the coffin for Lake Highlands with 8:40 remaining. With the Eagles’ goalie coming up to retrieve the ball, Volkmer beat him to the spot and got a clean shot off to give the Wildcats the 6-1 lead that they would end the game with.
Richardson’s lone score came just six minutes into the game. The Eagles delivered a corner kick right to Jose Nunez, who redirected it to Christopher Ramirez. Ramirez headed it in, opening scoring for the night, though Richardson’s lead wouldn’t last long.
The Eagles will close their season versus Irving MacArthur (6-15-2, 2-10-1) at 7:15 p.m. Tuesday at home.
Lake Highlands wraps up its regular season at 7:30 p.m. Tuesday on the road against Irving (12-2-7, 6-1-6).
“(We want to) keep this idea and motion going,” Guinnee said. “That we’re gonna go and we’re gonna go forward. We’re going to defend well and then we’re going to keep playing.”
