By MARIO AGUIRRE | STAFF WRITER
SAN ANTONIO — With JaColby Pemberton struggling to stand on his own power, Edinburg Vela saw an opportunity.
All year, and especially during these playoffs, Pemberton had been Lancaster’s most productive player, a 6-foot-6 athlete who averaged 20 points and nine rebounds. But after soaring above the rim for a two-handed stuff, Pemberton pulled himself up before landing awkwardly.
As officials called for time with Pemberton grabbing his hyperextended left knee, Rios urged his team to chip away at a 12-point deficit.
“It was unfortunate for him, and you never want to see anyone get hurt, but we knew it was one less big man that they had,” Rios said, “so we were going to try to make a run.”
It never materialized. As quickly as Chris Ochoa drained back-to-back 3-pointers to cut it to six, Lancaster pushed the lead back up to 12 heading into halftime.
And even though Pemberton never scored again, the senior went on to play five more minutes in the second half to log 12 for the game, providing enough of a boost to knock off Vela.
“Obviously his athletic ability is just phenomenal,” Rios said. “They have guys that can come in at any moment and do what they do for their team. We have the same for our team. But you could see their sense of urgency, when he went out, they stepped it up a notch.”
The semifinal marked Vela’s introduction to the UIL state tournament, a historic feat for the four-year school. The SaberCats (35-3) went up against the taller, quicker Tigers (35-2), who have three Division I athletes headed to Louisiana Tech (Pemberton), UTEP (Deon Barrett) and Ole Miss (Nate Morris) next year.
Even with Pemberton reduced to a role player the rest of the way, Lancaster went on to beat the SaberCats in virtually every facet of the game. The Tigers won every quarter. They outscored Vela 50-19 in the paint. They had 13 second-chance points, 12 fast-break points and their bench outscored the SaberCats’ 26-15.
And Pemberton, who missed part of the second quarter following the injury, finished with eight points on 3-for-3 shooting when he checked out with 5:07 left in the half.
“All the guys were like, ‘Yeah, we have a chance now,’” Vela’s Alec De La Cruz said, “but they didn’t slow down.”
For as much as Edinburg Vela had hoped to make it a slow-down, half-court game — much like its win over fast-breaking Laredo Nixon — it never got to that point.
Lancaster, ranked No. 3 by the Texas Association of Basketball Coaches, continually pushed the pace and was efficient from the field (58.5 percent) and from the free-throw line (78.9 percent).
In trying to match their play, the SaberCats went out of their usual five-in, five-out rotation, sticking with their starters for long stretches of the game, and found themselves out of rhythm.
“Unfortunately we couldn’t get it going today,” Rios said. “You could see in the end, the starters were getting winded.
“We were hoping (breaking the normal substitution pattern) wouldn’t affect us, but the magnitude of this game, I think it got them too excited and more tired.”
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