Hosts grab title game bids

teams go. That’s how it is in basketball tournaments and how it was this past weekend in the Farwell Tournament.

By the end of action Friday, the two host teams were headed to Saturday’s championship games, with both the Steers and Lady Blue scheduled to face Littlefield for the tournament crowns.

Farwell’s boys earned their way into Saturday’s game with respective 47-28 and 50-30 victories over Claude on Thursday and Hale Center on Friday. The Lady Blue punched their championship-game ticket with two different kinds of games — a 65-26 rout of Friona on Thursday and a 40-38 last-second win over Claude on Friday, the latter game’s difference-maker supplied by junior guard Presley Agee’s coast-to-coast layup as time expired.

The girls games were as night-and-day as the scores indicated. Farwell led 20-0 after the first quarter of Thursday’s game, 39-10 by halftime. Friday night, however, the Lady Blue trailed 24-17 at halftime, 32-23 in the third quarter. By the end of the third, Farwell still faced a 34-27 deficit.

With the Lady Mustangs leading 36-31 early in the fourth quarter, Farwell charged back. Senior forward Paulina Rodriguez sank a pair of free throws to make it 36-33, soon followed by a leaner in the lane from Agee, bringing the Lady Blue within just one as 5:01 remained in regulation.

After Farwell had several chances to pull ahead and Claude had opportunities to increase its lead, the Lady Blue finally scored the next points, with Rodriguez sinking a pair of free throws to hand them a 37-36 advantage. Agee then went 1-for-2 on technical foul shots, stretching Farwell’s lead to 38-36 with 3:06 to go in the fourth.

That score held until roughly a minute remained. Claude freshman guard Baylee Gabel drove from the right side toward the hoop but her layup rolled off the left side of the rim. She alertly ran to grab the rebound, then put in a short jumper from the left, tying the game at 38.

The Lady Steers then turned the ball over, but their trapping defense forced Claude to do the same. However, an offensive foul called on Agee sent the ball back to the Lady Mustangs.

That’s when Agee’s heroics went on full display. She came up with a steal on Farwell’s side of the floor as the fourth quarter’s waning seconds ticked away. Agee drove quick and hard all the way to Claude’s basket and laid the ball in just before the buzzer sounded.

“I honestly wasn’t paying attention to the clock,” said Agee, who scored a game-high 18 points. “So I just went and got one off. It was pretty cool.”

Agee said she never considered pulling up for a jumper. “No,” she said, “right to the rim.”

Texico’s boys beat Friona, 74-35, on Thursday behind a game-high 25 points from senior guard Luke Phipps. But, the Wolverines were done a day later when they ran head-on into Littlefield and were beaten 51-35, despite nine fourth-quarter points from junior post David Davalos.

It was Texico’s first loss of the season and the first for Craig Cook as Wolverines head coach.

“I told the boys afterwards, you’ve got two choices after that,” Cook said. “You either pay attention to the details that cost you or you keep making the same mistakes.”

The Texico boys played Hale Center in a third-place consolation game on Saturday.

Texico’s girls were beaten by Littlefield, 67-20, on Thursday.