DENNIS SILVA II | STAFF WRITER
LA JOYA — The one win La Joya Palmview needed, with its season on the line, took 9 hours, 15 minutes and two days to complete. But once it was over, and the Lobos won Game 2 to tie its Class 6A area playoff series against Brownsville Hanna, Palmview had conquered its biggest obstacle.
Palmview dismissed Hanna 10-0 in a run-ruled, five-inning Game 3 at the La Joya ISD Complex on Monday after winning the completion of a suspended Game 2, 5-4, in 10 innings earlier that afternoon. The Lobos rallied from a 1-0 series deficit after it fell 4-3 in Game 1 on Friday.
The teams played six innings of Game 2 on Saturday, when it was hosted in La Joya and San Juan, before the game was suspended because of inclement weather. Tied 4-4, the teams played two more evenly-played innings Monday before Victor Flores’ walk-off RBI double with one out in the 10th kept Palmview’s season alive.
“Game 2 was the hurdle,” Palmview coach Rick Garcia said. “Being tied going into the seventh and the time and effort it took. We had to work to get over the hump, and our kids worked. It’s a tough situation, not only winning two games back-to-back, but the way we had to do it and what we had to go through to do it.”
In Game 3, the revived Lobos (20-11-1) jumped on top 3-0 as junior right-hander Leo Perez took care of everything else. Perez, the team’s ace, won Game 2 by throwing four dominant innings of relief and then threw five more in Game 3.
In all on Monday, Perez threw nine shutout innings and surrendered four hits while striking out 11 and walking none in improving his record to 11-1. After throwing 97 pitches in a Game 1 loss on Friday, Perez was held to a 100-pitch total count on Monday. He never reached it, throwing 47 pitches in Game 2 and 43 in Game 3.
“I was feeling great and confident, especially the second game,” Perez said. “That was an intense win, and I just was so amped for Game 3. I knew if we came out with the bats, we’d win.”
The key for the Lobos was rain and lightning. Rain caused unplayable fields Saturday and lightning caused consistent delays, forcing Game 2 to be postponed. That allowed Perez extra rest.
While Garcia elected to use him Monday, Hanna coach Eddie Garcia did not opt to use sophomore ace Noe Guerrero on the same amount of three-day’ rest. Senior Alec Buitron started Game 3 and sophomore Raul Perez was used in relief.
“I’m not going to hurt a sophomore,” Eddie Garcia said. “I used to be a pitcher … a lot of people have different opinions on pitchers and limitations and rest. I never even thought about it. He’s got a bright future. Coaches have different philosophies. Mine is he did his job on Friday, and if we can’t do it in two games, it wasn’t meant to be. No area championship is worth hurting a kid.”
That made Game 2 even more essential, with Eddie Garcia knowing he would not use his ace for Game 3. And that’s why the Hanna coach was adamant about waiting out the weather and trying to finish Game 2 on Saturday before finally agreeing to just wait until Monday once the UIL consented.
“We were flat and it’s the wrong time to do it, but that’s baseball,” Eddie Garcia said of the Game 3 loss. “No excuses. They came back, they won, they did it the right way and that pitcher (Perez) is a beast. They earned it.”
The Lobos had eight hits and struck out just twice in Game 3. Ismael Martinez went 3-for-3 with four RBIs. Perez added a two-run single. Cesar Rosales and Steve Pena also contributed RBIs.
That was enough for Palmview to secure a third straight trip to the regional quarterfinals, this time against Laredo United later this week.
“Game 2 was the big one,” Martinez said. “We didn’t want our season to end, and we knew if we could just get to Game 3 that we liked our chances. It was a tiring process, going from Saturday to Monday, and there were a lot of nerves and anxiety. But we saw their heads go down a little bit after Game 2 and we kept pushing.”