By ANDREW CRUM, Staff Writer
Brownsville Veterans Memorial got its offense going early and used its defense late to seal it.
The Lady Chargers’ offensive attack — led by Briana Cortez and Jordan Rudd — quickly got going against the Harlingen South Lady Hawks during a 41-31 victory in District 32-6A action Tuesday at Brownsville Veterans.
Led by 14 points from Cortez and 13 points from Rudd, Brownsville Veterans raced out to a 12-2 lead and held a 14-5 advantage after the first quarter.
Cortez scored eight points, including two 3-pointers, and Rudd had four points during the first quarter as the Lady Chargers got good looks at the basket through the flow of their offense.
“Briana had some baskets early. She hit a couple of 3s, so that got us going and gave us a big cushion,” Brownsville Veterans coach Valentin Paz said. “If the energy on defense is there, then there’s more flow to the offense, more movement. We wanted to spread the floor … we were able to attack on the sides and get Briana into the paint for baskets or to the free throw line.”
Rudd got into early foul trouble during the second quarter and the Lady Hawks tried to rally. Led by Ruayda Bouls, who posted seven of her game-high 17 points in the second, Harlingen South closed the gap to three points but didn’t get any closer.
Rudd returned to the lineup to start the third quarter and was determined to make up for her time on the bench. She opened the half with a pair of steals and a bucket, and she added two others to give the Lady Chargers a 36-25 lead.
“We just need to finish games, we need four strong quarters,” Harlingen South coach Kelly Garrett said. “We were missing shots. We were not putting shots in for the opportunities we were getting, not finishing plays.”
Harlingen South (17-10, 5-3) was held without a field goal during the fourth quarter. The Lady Hawks were limited to 6 of 10 shooting from the free-throw line, including 5 of 8 from Bouls, but didn’t chip away at the lead.
Harlingen South finished 15 of 35 — including 13 of 23 from Bouls — from the charity strip for the game.
Brownsville Veterans (20-7, 7-1) hit a couple early buckets in the fourth quarter and Rudd added a free throw down the stretch to seal the win.
Paz said Maria Rios made the difference for the Lady Chargers in the second half.
“Maria played big defensively, and she had six points on offensive rebounds,” he said. “The complexity (of the press) changed when she started in the second half. We were able to pick up the intensity a whole lot more and clean up the boards.”
Rios had six points and finished with 14 rebounds for the Lady Chargers.
After back-to-back losses to the top two teams in district, Garrett knows what her team needs to do.
“It’s execution, working on our halfcourt game and our defense,” she said. “We just need to bounce back.”
After the win, Paz felt his squad was in good shape heading toward a postseason berth.
“We still feel we are on course to what we want,” he said. “Do we want to win district? Yes. But to us it’s more important to get good seeding in the playoffs because we want to make a long run. You make your reputation in the playoffs.
“The way people are going to respect what you do is if we do it in the playoffs, that’s where it counts. And winning today was important to that.”
Andrew Crum covers sports for The Brownsville Herald. You can reach him at (956) 982-6629 or via email at [email protected]. On Twitter he’s @andrewmcrum.