Serving Clovis, Portales and the Surrounding Communities
Serving Clovis, Portales and the Surrounding Communities
Clovis senior Teya Morris blows past La Cueva sophomore Brianna Sauter for the layup in the first half of Tuesday night's District 2-6A match up at Rock Staubus Gymnasium. Clovis defeated La Cueva 46-38.
Clovis senior Sydni Hill applies the defensive pressure to la Cueva sophomore Kaya Ingram as she crosses into the front court.
CLOVIS — Clovis’ girls basketball team must have been exhausted after Tuesday night’s game, having to try and beat La Cueva’s press all night.
If the Lady Wildcats were indeed tired, it was worth it. They did beat that suffocating pressure defense enough to earn a 46-38 district victory over the Lady Bears at Rock Staubus Gymnasium.
It was an entertaining game that included an 18-0 Clovis run to totally swing the momentum, plus 23 points overall from senior Teya Morris and big rebounds from the whole team — especially freshman Mikyla Harkley and junior Antanishwa Molett. The result was a second-place tie for the Lady ’Cats, who improved to 3-2 in District 2-6A play, drawing even with La Cueva in the standings.
“It was an excellent win for us,” Clovis head coach Jeff Reed said, “because La Cueva’s a good team and to beat them after losing to them both times last year, and them being in the state championship game last year, it’s a big win for us.
“Defensively, it was there again for us. We still didn’t score all the baskets we could’ve scored and needed, but we scored the right ones at the right moments. La Cueva helped us a little bit; they had a poor shooting night, they missed a lot of shots. Obviously, we’re going to have to do a lot better when we go up there.”
Though La Cueva stuck to every Clovis ballhandler like glue from start to finish, Morris was matter-of-fact about being able to beat the press more often than not.
“In districts, everybody runs that kind of pressure, so we’ve kind of been used to it,” she said. “But they got after us a little bit more, so we had to take control and take care of the ball a little bit more.”
It wasn’t going well for Clovis early on. The Wildcats trailed 17-9 late in the first quarter, and it was La Cueva that seemed to be taking control.
Then came the second quarter, where it was Clovis getting after the Lady Bears and keeping them from scoring until 5:43 remained in the third quarter.
“Coach Reed told us the second quarter was our quarter, and we needed to stop them on defense,” Morris said. “And we did just that.”
Clovis scored 15 in the second quarter — with seven points from Morris, four from Harkley, and two each from Molett and Sydni Hill.
With those points and none from La Cueva in the quarter, Clovis took a 24-17 lead into the break.
The Lady Wildcats scored the first three of the second half — on a Molett free throw and a field goal from Morris — before Kaya Ingram’s mid-range jumper finally ended La Cueva’s drought.
A Deja Sandoval floater made it 27-21, but a Harkley basket inside, a Brittni Chavez foul shot, and a Morris putback of her own miss gave Clovis a 32-21 advantage.
But, the Lady Bears then embarked on a 13-4 run that allowed them to sneak within a point, 36-34, in the fourth quarter.
The Lady ’Cats quickly answered with a pair of Chavez free throws to make it a four-point game. After a few minutes transpired without either team scoring, Clovis found a good way to beat the La Cueva press — with Wildcat guard Brittni Chavez impersonating Vikings quarterback Case Keenum and Morris playing the role of receiver Stefon Diggs. Morris bolted to past mid-court and Chavez flung a pass to her, allowing her to dribble for a wide-open layup.
Chavez and Morris would connect again — shortly after Molett hit a foul shot to make it 41-35 — and Morris went Stefon Diggs-ing her way for the easy layup to give her team an eight-point lead with less than two minutes to go.
“We’ve worked on that during every pre-game (practice),” Morris said. “We felt good enough to actually run it in a game.”
Though La Cueva’s Brooke Nelson soon answered with a trey that narrowed the Bears’ deficit to 43-38, Morris added another bucket that stretched her team’s lead to seven.
Following a defensive rebound by Molett, Chavez hit one of two free throws, handing the Lady Wildcats a 46-38 advantage with just 16.6 seconds left in the fourth quarter.
It was more than a victory for Clovis. The Lady Wildcats got confidence, too.
“Oh, a lot,” Morris said. “Hopefully, we take the momentum into Eldorado on Saturday.”
“The bottom line is winning your home games,” Reed said. “And we won that home game we had to have.”
