Turnovers let Lady Sundevils pull away to beat St. Mike’s
Pojoaque Valley leaves tournament with 12-1 record, eight-game winning streak
By the time the final buzzer sounded Friday evening to wrap up overtime and bring about the end of the Lady Horsemen Christmas Tournament inside Perez-Shelley Gymnasium, a couple of things were perfectly clear as teams headed home to usher in the new year.
First, Pojoaque Valley’s girls basketball team is basically all that and a bag o’ chips. The Elkettes swept through the round-robin field and left town with an eight-game winning streak, a 12-1 overall record and a healthy dose of respect from anyone it has crossed paths with.
Second, free throw shooting is an art form, and not everyone has the tools to sculpt a masterpiece.
Let’s start with the latter, which punctuated the overtime session of Friday’s tournament finale between host St. Michael’s and visiting Española Valley. The Lady Horse-
men opened OT by missing five of their first six attempts from the stripe in a 47-41 loss to the Lady Sundevils, then compounded things with three sloppy turnovers that allowed Española (7-6) to pull away in the final minute.
The last turnover capped what was a frustrating end as the Lady Sundevils’ full-court press pinned a St. Michael’s player along the baseline near Española’s basket. She tried to pass the ball out but it banged off the side of the backboard and led to the clinching points from the free throw line.
“The mistakes hurt us, yes, but it was a good tournament and the message to the players is to learn from this and stay positive,” said Martin Esquibel, the Lady Horsemen’s first-year head coach.
St. Michael’s won two of its three games in the tournament, as did Española Valley. The Lady Horsemen certainly had a chance at a sweep after making a defensive stop with just over a minute to play in regulation and the score tied at 38. They held for the last shot, withering the clock down to 8.3 seconds after a timeout.
“The idea was to get the ball into one of our two post players and see what we could get,” Esquibel said.
That never happened as a five-second violation on the inbounds pass helped send the game into overtime. It was there that Española put the game game away by scoring all but two of its points from the free throw line. They were just 7-for-14 from the line, but it was more than enough for the win.
The Lady Horsemen were just 13-for-27 from the line for the game.
“You can practice all you want, teach these players how to take their time and shoot free throws,” said Española head coach Johnny Abeyta, “but you just have to realize that not every teenage player is going to be able to do it. These girls get nervous, they feel the pressure and they make it harder on themselves than they have to. You try to tell them to relax, but they’re kids. It’s not easy.”
Kaylee Chavez had 20 points to lead the Lady Sundevils. She had 15 of those after halftime, including a glistening 7-for-8 effort from the line. She was named to the all-tournament team, as was teammate Kaylinn Martinez.
St. Michael’s got 14 points from Carissa Padilla and 10 from Sydney Halford.
Heading into a tournament in Albuquerque next week, Esquibel said he will continue to work on free throws by doing what he’s already been doing at practice.
“You do what you can; pump in music when they’re shooting, create situations where they should be feeling pressure, having them run before they shoot,” he said. “Basically just keep working. That’s all you can do.”
Jodi Gormley was named to the all-tournament team from the Lady Horsemen while Pojoaque’s Michaela Martinez was named most valuable player and teammate Taylor Roybal alltournament.
If some teams had hiccups and issues this week, the one team that did not was Pojoaque. The Elkettes’ eight-game streak has been by an average of 29 points. Their only loss came on a neutral court to Class 5A power St. Pius.
They hammered Cottonwood Classical, 52-13, on Friday despite laying off in the fourth quarter by scoring just two points. Everyone on the roster scored, led by Dallas Archibald’s 12 points. Martinez had six but played only sparingly before exiting for good early in the second half.
Cobre won Friday’s early game, beating Sandia Prep, 64-36, as Skkyla Guck finished with 20 points. She was the tournament’s leading scorer with 67 points in three games.
With the regular season at the halfway point, Esquibel and Abeyta were asked to assess their team’s play with district openers just around the corner.
“We’re such a young team with all the freshmen and sophomores, and young kids like that tend to go up and down and make some mistakes,” Abeyta said. “But we’re getting there. We’re looking ahead to our district and it’s one we think we can win. That’s the way we’re approaching this. We think we can do this, maybe take this team down to Albuquerque and see what it can do. We’ll see.”
As for Esquibel, he is as optimistic as Abeyta.
“I’d give us a B,” he said. “There are some things we can work on, sure, but I like where this team is. I like the way we’re playing. If we can clean some things up and, you know, make a few free throws I think we’ll be good.”