NO ANSWERS
Pojoaque Valley hangs tough, but Moriarty’s hot shooter is unstoppable
ALBUQUERQUE – Pojoaque Valley coach Seledon Martinez tried every defensive trick in the book to stop Moriarty’s Alyssa Adams in the Class 4A girls state basketball tournament semifinals Thursday.
“We went a little bit of box and one and tried triangle and two,” he said. “It worked for awhile but they sort of mastered what we were trying to do. He (Moriarty coach Joe Bailey) adjusted and moved some of his kids. It’s only 32 minutes.”
And for the first eight of those minutes, the seventhseeded Elkettes did a pretty good job of shutting down Adams. But then she broke loose and so did the No. 3 Pintos, who galloped off to a 47-38 win to eliminate Pojoaque. Adams finished with 29 points while adding 12 boards and three blocks for good measure.
“She’s strong and the rest of her team backed her up,” Martinez said. “My girls gave it everything they had.”
The Elkettes (23-6) did indeed, leading 11-3 early and still leading 20-13 late in the second quarter.
But then Moriarty strung together a 15-0 run surrounding halftime and Pojoaque never led again.
“We went through a little lapse and we didn’t answer,” Martinez said. “We had a chance to answer and we didn’t. They came through with a run.”
The killer was an Adams 3-pointer with 40 seconds left in the half, while two late shots from the Elkettes rolled off the rim.
The Pintos (27-4) then took advantage of a problem that has plagued Pojoaque all season, as they out hard after the halftime break.
“I think we just always struggle in the third quarter, especially, we always have,” said guard Adrianna Quintana. “Our mentality was just to come out strong and we didn’t execute that completely. To an extent we did, but not completely and I think that’s where we crumbled. … We’re not as warm. We’re not as on top of things.”
By the end of the third quarter, the Elkettes trailed 36-25.
To its credit, however, Pojoaque was able to recover to a degree and several times pull within three points in the closing minutes.
When Adams went to the bench with an ankle injury, it appeared the Elkettes were in a good position.
“We could tell right away that they opened the door for us and we just had to walk through,” Martinez said. “We made a little bit of a run, but we had to sustain all the way to the end and we didn’t. Then she came back in.”
She being Adams, who sealed the game with eight successful foul shots in the closing quarter.
That turned out to be the real difference in the game as Moriarty was 28-of-35 from the foul line while Pojoaque got only 13 foul shots, making 10.
Still, knocking off No. 2 Robertson on Tuesday and taking it down to the end against Moriarty showed that Pojoaque is a program that is moving up.
“I’ve said this from Day 1, it’s a process,” Martinez said. “The maturity that they’ve shown since the first game they played with me. They went from girls to becoming women. And now we have to take another step because in reality we’re taking a step up division-wise. The foundation that we have and the kids that we have, they work hard. They give me everything they’ve got. There’s still stuff we need to work on, but we’ll be back.”