By ROY HESS | The Brownsville Herald
HARLINGEN — In Tuesday’s non-district rematch between Brownsville Veterans Memorial and Harlingen High, the Lady Chargers played considerably better than when they lost to the Lady Cardinals by a big margin less than a week ago.
Still, it wasn’t enough to keep the Lady Cardinals from breaking open a fairly close four-point game in the final quarter to win 58-42 on their home court and improve to 11-4 on the season.
Harlingen High defeated Brownsville Veterans 73-32 last Friday in Valley View’s Border Brawl Tournament.
“Our girls started picking up the intensity with their defense, and that’s one of the things we like to live off of,” Lady Cardinals coach Ashley Moncivaiz said. “We like to play pressure defense and have ball movement (on offense). We had that tonight.
“We started off a little slow and I want to say it was the third and fourth quarters when we really started picking things up,” she added. “We just couldn’t get anything going (to pull away until the fourth quarter). The one that kept us in the game was (senior post/guard) Nadia Flores (scoring from outside and inside and finishing with 15 points, including a 3-pointer).”
The Lady Chargers entered the fourth period trailing only 34-30, but the Lady Cardinals scored the first 15 points of the quarter to lead 49-30 before Brownsville Veterans tallied its first basket of the period with 3:24 remaining.
“It was a 24-12 run (in the fourth quarter by Harlingen High) and that was the difference in the game,” said Lady Chargers coach Valentin Paz, whose team slipped to 4-11. “Up until the end of the third quarter, we were playing great defense. We had only committed three fouls, which means we were playing good defense. Then we committed three or four fouls in the first minute (of the fourth period), so it was a tough finish for us.
“We have a very young team with only one senior and the rest are sophomores,” he added. “We have to learn to keep our poise. There are no such things as moral victories, right? But last time we got shellacked by Harlingen (by 41 points). Our girls came together tonight and responded real well (to that tournament loss). I’m very proud of the way the girls worked so hard and competed.”
The Lady Cardinals never trailed. They were up 13-4 after one quarter and 21-17 at halftime. It remained close until the Lady Cardinals surged ahead in the early minutes of the final quarter.
Hannah Meyers, Brownsville Veterans’ lone senior, scored a game-high 19 points, including a pair of 3-pointers. Teammate Lizzie Garza added 10 points.
Taegan Dickey and Flores led the Lady Cardinals with 17 and 15 points, respectively. Andrea Cortez contributed 14 points for Harlingen High. Dickey scored 10 of her 17 points in the final period.
The Lady Cardinals’ biggest lead of 22 points, 54-32, came with 2:27 left when Cortez sank the first of two free throws. She missed the second attempt.
Brownsville Veterans, the defending champion in District 32-5A, next plays at Edinburg Vela at noon Saturday, while Harlingen High next plays at McAllen High at 2:30 p.m. Saturday. Both are non-district contests.