KEVIN NARRO | Staff Writer
HARLINGEN — Four Harlingen South Hawks scored in double figures, led by senior Ethan Mireles, in a 69-54 win over San Perlita on Friday night.
Mireles, who netted a team-high 15 points, entered Friday night looking for answers and found them, stringing together one of his better performances on the season. Brady Bennett scored 14 points, and Ryan Fechner and Rudy Rodriguez each scored 10 points.
“Honestly, this is the most I’ve shot in a game,’ Mireles said. “The shots were just there, and I was feeling it. I knew I was on when I hit the 3 before the half. This was one of the better shooting nights I have had all year.”
South fell behind 7-2 but quickly settled in and outran the Trojans on a 13-0 run to take a 15-7 lead at the end of the first period. The second quarter lead grew to 27-13, with the Hawks outscoring the Trojans 23-14.
“We have a tendency of starting games slowly,” Mireles said. “But once we get in motion and find our groove we are good to go.”
Along with the offense came physical defense from the Hawks that caused fits for the Trojans and threw them off their rhythm during the first half.
“We try to be more physical and take over the paint,” Hawks coach Brian Molina said. “They have Tige (Johnson), but for the most part we knew we were going to be the bigger and taller team. San Perlita does a good job on scoring in transition, so our game plan was to try and get them to score in a halfcourt set and try and get as many easy buckets as we could. And Tige did a good job on blocking shots but we did a good job on attacking the boards, and that helped us out.”
The Trojans managed to answer with a stronger second half and cut the lead to 13 points late in the fourth quarter. Johnson scored a game-high 18 points and EJ Nieto finished with 16.
San Perlita wraps up non-district play and meets La Sara in its district opener Tuesday.
“Credit to South, they took us out of our rhythm in the first half,” Trojans coach Nataniel Garza said. “That was a big reason on why we didn’t shoot very well. In the second half we made some adjustments and we shot better. We pretty much matched South in the second half, and our halfcourt offense was better and we rebounded better. We fell behind early because of our rebounding and us not finding our shot.”
The Trojans will look to flip the switch Tuesday, as they will begin their quest for a third straight district title.
“We are not where we need to be right now, but like I tell the kids, ‘It’s not how you start but how you finish,’” Garza said. “We don’t want to peak too early, and I don’t think we have peaked yet. I think we need to go through these kind of games to grow as a team and get better. We are not where we need to be, but we are headed in the right direction.”
The Hawks, meanwhile, will tip off district play Jan. 17 against Brownsville Rivera.
“We have a week to prepare. This was a good measuring stick for us,” Molina said. “San Perlita will probably have a good run in the playoffs, so credit to them for playing against bigger schools. Tonight we got to work on some things. They like to get out and run, and in our district we have teams that like to run.”