The Austin area is well represented at the high school Soccer State Championships this weekend in Georgetown, with local entries in three of the four 5A and 6A classifications. The Cedar Park Vista Ridge girls and Pflugerville Connally boys will be underdogs in 5A semifinals on Thursday, both against teams from Frisco. The Lake Travis boys, at 24-1, probably have a better chance, but they’re part of a really stacked 6A draw. They play one-loss Brownsville Lopez in the last semifinal, Friday night at 7:30pm, with unbeaten Coppell on the other side of the bracket. The tournament runs Wed.-Sat., April 13-16 at Birkelbach Field. There are 5A and 6A semifinals all day Thursday and Friday, 9:30am-7:30pm, and the finals are Saturday at 11am, 1:30pm, 4pm, and 6:30pm; see the full schedule at www.uiltexas.org/soccer/state.
The European Champions League saw a pretty major upset Wednesday, as Atletico Madrid knocked out Barcelona, 2-0. They join crosstown rivals Real Madrid in the semifinals, though Real needed a hat-trick from Cristiano Ronaldo to claw back from a two-goal deficit to Wolfsburg. Meanwhile, Bayern Munich cruised through, and Manchester City knocked off Paris St. Germain to become the first English club to make the semifinals since Chelsea in 2012. Semifinals are April 26-27 and May 3-4, with the final May 28 in Milan.
This article appears in April 15 • 2016.