Robertson hammers St. Mike’s
Lady Horsemen’s shooting goes cold for long stretch; Lady Cardinals next face West Las Vegas in The Pit
It takes a certain amount of fortune to put the big orange ball through the big metal hoop.
For nearly two full quarters, the St. Michael’s girls basketball team failed to do that from the field and it earned it a first-round exit from the Class 4A State Tournament on Friday night in Michael Marr Gymnasium. Thirdseeded Robertson won going away, 51-36, to set up a quarterfinal matchup on Tuesday in Albuquerque against crosstown rival West Las Vegas.
The Lady Horsemen finish their season 13-15, having lost three of their four meetings with Robertson. Their undoing was a disastrous 15-minute, 54-second span between the second and fourth quarters in which they missed 21 straight shots and turned it over nearly a dozen times.
“You can’t win if you don’t score,” said St. Michael’s head coach Martin Romero. “As a coach, you just go in there and thank the girls for their service and hard work for all these past months. People don’t really realize the sacrifice these girls make. All the practices and bumps and bruises. It’s a long season and it’s always sad to see it end.”
Seeded 14th coming in, St. Michael’s held its own for most of the first half despite committing 16 turnovers in the first two quarters. The proverbial roof caved in late in the half after Lady Cardinals coach Leroy Barela was assessed a technical foul for arguing a call. It sparked a 7-0 run to close the half and amped up the team’s defensive intensity from one end to the other.
“It’s the old adage; does the technical foul give a boost to his own team?” Barela said. “I don’t know. I guess maybe it did.”
It didn’t hurt that Lady Cardinals forward Alianza Darley was on fire. She finished with game-high 19 points, scoring four times on breakaway layups after a St. Michael’s turnover. She had nine points in the fourth quarter.
“She’s such a long, versatile player,” Barela said. “When she gets going like that she can be hard to handle.”
One of four players capable of double figures for the Lady Cards (21-6), Darley was the one player St. Michael’s couldn’t match up with. The Lady Horsemen
focused on slowing point guard Maria Barela and trying to limit center Angelica Montoya.
Montoya was saddled with foul trouble for most of the game but still managed nine points, four rebounds and a blocked shot before fouling out with Robertson up 40-25 with just four minutes to go.
It was her low-post bucket late in the first quarter that snapped a 6-all tie and handed the Lady Cardinals a lead they would hold the rest of the way.
Barela had 11 points, getting six of those from the free throw line. Tessa Ortiz added seven points, hitting one of the three 3-pointers Robertson had in the game.
“They do have some depth and, really, we came in here trying to limit the touches by [Montoya] and [Barela], but you can’t keep all of them down,” Romero said. “We had our chances but we couldn’t get anything to go. Credit them for making it tough.”
Down 24-15 at halftime, St. Michael’s did cut it to five after opening the second half with four straight free throws. Just when it seemed the Lady Horsemen might be poised for a run, center Danielle Vigil was whistled for her fourth foul at the 5:19 mark of the third quarter and sat on the bench.
That left Montoya and fellow Robertson big Jazmyne Jenkins to enjoy a huge size advantage in the paint. Jenkins grabbed four rebounds with Vigil out, helping the Lady Cardinals pull away with an 8-0 run to open a commanding 33-19 lead late in the third quarter.
Jocelyn Fernandez finished with 17 points for St. Michael’s, capping a solid prep career. As the final buzzer sounded, she and a handful of her teammates showed their emotions while lining up for the postgame handshake.
Vigil finished with seven points before fouling out. Halley Garcia added five points off the bench. She had her team’s lone 3-pointer as the Lady Horsemen were 1-for-10 overall from distance.