By JOSHUA McKINNEY, Staff Writer
Athlos Leadership Academy gave a titanic effort to advance to the school’s first state tournament.
The Titans beat San Benito IDEA 40-38 in a wild TCSAAL regional championship game Saturday at the RGV Vipers’ practice facility in Edinburg.
The game came down to clutch free-throw shooting from Jonathan Robinson, who nailed a pair from the charity stripe with the game tied at 38 and 9.9 seconds left on the clock.
“Crazy, crazy game,” Athlos coach Alex Lucio said. “Up and down. This is an awesome IDEA San Benito team. This is a team that scares me every year. Every time we’ve played them, it’s always come down to the wire. This is a good game to test us and get us prepared for state. They have very good size, they push the ball and go man-to-man against us. You could tell toward the very end our sophomore mistakes almost cost us the game, and that’s something we need to polish up by Saturday.”
It’s hard to prepare for pressure situations like this, but Robinson thought daily practice from the free-throw line helped him with the game on the line.
“It was very nerve-wracking, but me and my dad go outside every day and work on free throws,” Robinson said. “Hard work pays off.”
San Benito IDEA had a chance to tie the game and send it to overtime when Mark Gracia was fouled with 5.2 seconds to go.
Lucio called a timeout before Gracia shot his free throws to give the Titans last-minute instructions on what to do with the ball if his players get the rebound.
Gracia missed both shots, and Damian Maldonado grabbed the rebound on the second. Maldonado threw the ball from the baseline to Manny Tejada at half-court.
Tejada held on to the ball long enough to milk the final seconds of the clock and give Athlos the victory.
“You can’t get that nervous,” Lucio said. “You have to believe in your players. I had to call a timeout at the very end because I had to make sure they knew what to do if they got the rebound. Just throw the ball in the other half so the clock would waste. They listened to what I said, but something we really need to work on is breaking the press.”
Tejada scored 12 points to lead the Titans. Maldonado had 11 points and 18 rebounds, and Cristian Hernandez had 10 points, 10 rebounds and three blocks.
Gracia had a team-high 10 points for the Dragons. He also had six rebounds, five assists and three steals. Abel Cantu scored eight points, and Gabriel Cespedes had eight rebounds and four steals.
Athlos came into the fourth with a 29-26 lead over San Benito IDEA and started the quarter on a 6-0 run to widen the lead to nine points. The Titans’ lead extended to 10 points after a pair of free throws from Maldonado.
Cespedes scored a bucket with less than two minutes left to start the chaotic finale. The Dragons stole the ball seven times during the course of a minute and went on an eight-point scoring streak.
Gracia scored on a layup with 13 seconds left to tie the game at 38, but Robinson’s free-throws put out the Dragons’ fire.
San Benito IDEA coach Kristy Winnie was proud of her team’s effort in the game, which is as far as it has advanced in the TSCAAL playoffs.
“That all comes down to desire and heart,” Winnie said. “How much they put into the game and how far they’ve come. They’ve never had a winning season like this, and they’re just learning how to win. We’ve been behind in the last two games, 17 in one and 22 in the other one. They just fight back, and it’s their heart and their spirit.”
The win sends Athlos to the TSCAAL state tournament Saturday at Buda Hays. Game times and opponents are yet to be determined.
Joshua McKinney covers sports for The Brownsville Herald. You can reach him at (956) 982-6663 or via email at [email protected]. On Twitter he’s @joshuabvherald.