By ADAM KUJAWSKI, Staff Writer
The Porter Cowboys’ Jesus Garcia led his team down the stretch, scoring nine of his team’s 19 fourth-quarter points.
Thanks to his late performance — during which he hit 2 of 4 shots from the field and 5 of 5 shots from the free-throw line — Porter defeated the Rivera Raiders 59-52 in a non-district game Friday at Porter.
The Cowboys played strong defense, shot well and were a perfect nine-for-nine from the charity stripe during the final quarter, allowing them to seal the victory.
“Our defense is playing really good,” Porter coach Luis Garza said. “We play really good basketball, it’s just a matter of us being able to move the ball, and I thought we moved the ball a lot better today.”
Rivera’s 10 points during the fourth quarter were its lowest mark of the night. The Raiders didn’t score until there was just more than five minutes remaining in the game on an Alex Rangel 3-pointer. By the time they scored again, Porter had completed a 12-3 run.
“We weren’t hitting the shots the last quarter,” Rivera coach Saul Villarreal said. “We took some good shots, we just weren’t hitting them.”
The Raiders had been tied or ahead for most of the game prior to the fourth.
The Cowboys were ahead 10-7 with 2:30 left in the first quarter, but the teams ended up even at 15 points apiece by the end of the first. That was made possible by Rangel, after he hit three consecutive shots during the final 1:30.
The Raiders opened the second quarter on a 10-4 run, but Porter answered with six straight points.
Rivera scored five points near the end of the first half, but Garcia made a layup as time expired to pull his team to within two points heading into halftime.
Porter started the third quarter on a 5-2 run but didn’t maintain momentum, and the teams exchanged baskets for the remainder of the period. Rivera entered the fourth quarter ahead by two points.
“I’m happy with what I saw, because I think offensively we’re making significant improvements,” Garza said. “We just keep getting better and better.”
Garcia led all scorers with 22 points, and teammate Eli Martinez chipped in 11. Rangel tallied the most points for the Raiders with 16.
Each team will continue its non-district schedule Dec. 16. The Cowboys travel to San Benito to face the Greyhounds at 6 p.m., and Rivera will play host to Edinburg North at 7:30 p.m.
Adam Kujawski covers sports for The Brownsville Herald. You can reach him at (956) 982-6663 or via email at [email protected]. On Twitter he’s @adamkujo1.