Cats have homecourt for the holidays

CLOVIS — With Clovis’ girls basketball team tipping off on the last day of November, the Clovis boys in early December, holiday tournament time comes fast.

It will begin for both teams on Thursday at Rock Staubus Gymnasium, with the girls tipping off their Plateau Tournament against Los Alamos at 6:30 p.m., and the boys starting their Griego and Sons Tournament against Sandia Prep at 8 p.m.

No matter how the tournaments unfold, the Clovis games will be 6:30 p.m. for the girls and 8 p.m. for the boys.

Holiday tournament time is a big deal. First and foremost, the games count, they’re not exhibition. Secondly, they give teams a chance to prepare for a state-tournament style pace against some fierce competition they wouldn’t ordinarily see.

“I think it’s going to be tough,” Clovis boys coach Jaden Isler said. “We’ve got St. Mike’s, who’s ranked No. 1 in 3A. Sandia Prep’s in the top five in 3A. Volcano Vista’s going to be probably top three in our class, if not the No. 1. El Paso Cathedral’s always really good. It’s going to be a tough tournament. We’re going to have to try to go win our first two games, and see if we can go at El Paso Cathedral or Volcano Vista in the final. I think one of those two teams will end up (in the final) on that side. That gives us a chance to, again, go up against somebody that’s highly, highly-ranked in our class and have a chance to maybe go get ’em.”

Sandia Prep enters Thursday’s game at 3-2. Volcano Vista begins the action at 4-1 and St. Mike’s at 6-2. Cathedral heads in at 16-5, because the Texas teams have played a lot more basketball than their New Mexico counterparts. Cathedral will play Lovington (3-5) on Thursday at 3 p.m.

It’s certainly a wide variety of teams, of talent, of styles. It will likely take a lot to beat any of them during the three-day tournament.

“We’ve just got to do what we do,” Clovis junior guard Dewayne Dawson said. “Execute, play like dogs on defense, be aggressive on defense.”

When the Clovis girls take on Los Alamos Thursday, they’ll be playing their first game at Rock Staubus Gym since rallying to beat Cleveland 41-35 on Dec. 7. Since then, the Lady Wildcats have been an itinerant bunch, traveling to Espanola Valley, Estacado, Rio Rancho for three tournament games, and then last Saturday to Sandia, where they lost 52-43.

“We get to play at home,” Clovis girls coach Jeff Reed said. “We haven’t gotten to play at home for quite a while, so we’re road-weary right now and are excited to be playing at home again.”

On that long road swing, Clovis went 1-5 and dropped to 3-6. The Lady ’Cats hope their short holiday respite and some home cooking help turn things around.

“I think the girls are excited about it,” Reed said. “We’ll come back refreshed and ready to go to practice on Wednesday and play Thursday, Friday, Saturday.”

Los Alamos will enter Thursday’s game with the same 3-6 record as Clovis. “Hopefully we can play well and get a chance to get a victory,” Reed said.

Looming next would be the Farmington (8-1) vs. Borger (5-7) winner.

“If we can win, that’ll be a tough opponent,” Reed said. “I really think we have a great chance to get to the championship game of our own tournament. We haven’t been there in a while. It’s a fun environment on that Saturday night, especially if the boys get there, too.”

Success in these tournaments could propel each team on to success in January and February and they hope, March.

“It helps us find out what we’re able to do,” Dawson said.

“A lot like all these three-game tournaments, you’ve got to play three games in as many days,” Isler said. “You’ve got to play well, you’ve got to turn around and get ready for a team on a short preparation for the next game and be able to execute it without being able to go through a bunch of practices to get ready for them.”

Reed would like his players to get a lot out of this tournament weekend.

“Hopefully some wins,” he said, “and starting to get some confidence as far as winning is concerned. All six of our losses, we’ve been in the game, but we don’t take care of business. So I’m hoping we can win some games and launch us into 2019. I told the girls, if they can reel three off in this tournament, all of a sudden we’re 6-6 and we’re on a roll.”