By CLAIRE CRUZ, Staff Writer
RIO HONDO — The Rio Hondo Lady Bobcats and Raymondville Bearkats both had reason to celebrate after picking up wins in their respective portion of a basketball doubleheader Tuesday.
The Lady Bobcats got to hoist their District 32-4A championship trophy and cut down the net following their 72-17 victory over Raymondville in the first game of the night. Rio Hondo is ranked No. 10 in Class 4A by the Texas Girls Coaches Association at 14-0 overall, 9-0 in district. It will look to close the regular season with an undefeated record on Friday against Hidalgo.
“I’m super proud of them,” Rio Hondo coach Victor Sauceda said. “It’s been an interesting, hectic year. Just being able to play was the biggest issue, and I was fortunate we didn’t have any issues where we had to quarantine. They’ve adjusted and they’ve continued to get better as the season’s gone on. They’re doing the little things that we’re going to need to do to be successful in the playoffs, so I think they’re peaking at the right time and I hope that we can continue that in the playoffs and get past that first round.”
The Lady Bobcats controlled their contest with the Lady Bearkats from the jump. They opened up a 21-0 lead after the first quarter and kept Raymondville off the board for 11 minutes with their suffocating defense. Natalie Martinez and Eliza Rodriguez applied heavy pressure to ball-handlers to force miscues, and they notched steals and interceptions throughout the night.
Raymondville put five points on the board during the second quarter and eight points in the third. Amber Tamez (eight points) was the catalyst for the Lady Bearkats’ offense, driving through traffic to get Raymondville into a half-court setup and hitting some good shots. Tamez and Avery Knight both sank 3-pointers to get their team and fans excited. Miranda Hernandez and Aliyah Cantu provided energy, and kept the Lady Bearkats fighting to the end despite a large deficit.
Rio Hondo poured it on behind its defense and success in transition. The Lady ’Cats cleaned up on the boards for multiple opportunities when they didn’t hit shots, and scored early and often off forced turnovers. Martinez was the top scorer with 27 points, followed by Rodriguez and Alexis Rhyner, who both scored 17.
“We preach defense,” Sauceda said. “We get deflections, steals, the girls are active. I always demand energy. I don’t care who scores, as long as we’re playing defense, so they’ve got that mantra down and it has been showing in the games.”
The Raymondville Bearkats showed “mental toughness” as they battled and held on for a 61-57 victory over the Rio Hondo Bobcats in an intense game to end the night.
“We had to fight through a lot of adversity, but in the end we hung on long enough,” Raymondville coach John Tamez said. “Figuring that we lost our two big guys, I thought the guys that were out there battled very well. We’re a young team, we’ve only got two returning guys. They composed themselves long enough to get a ‘W’ today.”
After a low-scoring first quarter in which Raymondville took a slim 8-7 lead, the teams swapped buckets and lead changes for the first half of the second frame. Then, the Bearkats opened their advantage as Ethan Tagle (23 points), Joshua Valdez (nine) and Jayson Cantu (12) played tight defense and hit big shots. A buzzer-beating 3-pointer from Tagle put Raymondville on top 28-18 at halftime, and the momentum carried over to the third quarter.
Tagle and Jayden Garcia brought the energy, and solid play in the paint from Bearkats bigs Cantu and Diego Gutierrez got the Raymondville fans fired up. John Rubalcaba contributed four straight points off the bench to give the Bearkats a 12-point lead. Rio Hondo chipped away at the deficit behind the play of Ethan Jeradiah (27) and Lucas Hernandez, but Raymondville’s relentless defensive attack put the clamps back on the Bobcats’ offense and opened its advantage to 48-35.
“When we executed and broke that press we were able to get some easy baskets, and that became the key. We held (Rio Hondo scoreless) for six minutes, I thought that was awesome for this group,” Tamez said.
The Bearkats’ trio of Tagle, Valdez and Garcia showed their speed and led a defense that continued to give Rio Hondo fits at the start of the fourth. But the departure of Cantu and Gutierrez due to fouls put a damper on Raymondville’s production and gave the Bobcats a chance to claw back into the game.
Jeradiah, Ivan Juarez (15), Johnathan Ayala and Sam Vasquez were at the heart of Rio Hondo’s fight as the Bobcats came all the way back to tie the game at 54 with 1:10 remaining. Juarez and Jeradiah showed their tenacity as they drove to the basket, and the defensive pressure sparked by Ayala and Vasquez forced many turnovers and kept Raymondville from getting many offensive chances.
But inconsistent free-throw shooting during the final quarter by the Bobcats and big minutes off the bench from Slade Gutierrez helped Raymondville pound out the win. Raymondville’s defense made clutch stops during the final minute, and Slade Gutierrez and Tagle finished at the basket to give the Bearkats an edge that they didn’t relinquish.
“Thank God for the lead, because they chipped away at it just like we thought they would,” Tamez said. “After we lost our big guys, we challenged the kids, said, ‘Hey, this is the time for you guys to shine.’ The quiet heroes here were Slade (Gutierrez) and John (Rubalcaba). Those were the contributions we needed, from the guys that don’t get too much playing time. That was the key in the end.”