WESLACO — It’s early in the girls basketball season and like many other teams, the Harlingen South Lady Harks are still working themselves into game shape.
South is also taking its early season bumps and it showed during the second half in their 53-41 loss to Laredo Cigarroa during bracket play of the Mid-Valley Classic on Saturday morning at Weslaco East High School.
The Lady Hawks led by seven points midway through the third quarter, but turnovers and untimely fouls led to 17-0 run by the Lady Toros, which switched the momentum for good.
“We had turnovers and bad fouls, which Cigarroa converted on,” said South head coach Kelly Garrett. “At times we run out of gas and we need to slow things down.”
South point guard Breanna Gonzalez got into the lane often and post Tina Montez got good looks at high-percentage shots.
Gonzalez finished with eight points (all in the first half), as did Montez.
Mikaela Flores benefitted the most from South’s play in the post and drained four shots from downtown for all 12 of her points.
South had some success underneath and was able to get offensive boards, but missed a lot of shots and struggled to get to the line as they took jus two free throws in the second half and missed them both.
“I think our girls are staying positive and know we had a chance to win this game, but we missed it,” Garrett said. “We missed easy shots in the paint, but right now this is our time to learn and get better; the girls know those shots will eventually fall.”
South moved on to play in the third-place consolation game Saturday night, but came up short against Laredo United South 54-42. In the loss, Gonzalez had 16 points, five rebounds and two assists.
Still, getting some wins under their belt was the most important thing for the Hawks.
Before Saturday morning, South picked up wins over Laredo Nixon, Edcouch-Elsa and Brownsville Frontier and placed second in pool play behind Weslaco East.
“It’s good experience, especially for those girls who lack varsity experience and it helps get our legs under us,” Garrett said. “It really gives us a chance to work on plays and our defense. It’ll pay off come district time.”
This year, one thing the Lady Hawks have is experience. They have eight returning lettermen, but only three were starters a year ago.
“We have a lot of girls with experience, but not a lot of those girls got a lot of playing time,” Garrett explained. “We had a set group and a rotation last year, but we’ll get there.”