Elida, Melrose boys advance

ELIDA — It’s been a special season for the Elida boys basketball team, and the Tigers aren’t ready to see it end just yet. Especially senior guard Tyce Delk.

Delk scored 17 of Elida’s 23 first-half points and finished with 29 on Saturday as the Tigers downed Logan 61-41 in a Class 1A state round-of-16 matchup.

“He’s playing well at the right time,” Elida boys coach Jared Fraze said. “He’s had some unbelievable games after the EPAC (tournament in January).”

Only a few years removed from not being able to field a boys team, the Tigers (22-7) advanced to a 1:15 p.m. quarterfinal matchup today against second-seeded Maxwell (23-4) at Bernalillo H.S.

“I knew I had to get going on a big-time stage,” Delk said. “We all get to keep playing; now we’ve just got to keep it up.

“It’s been a blessing to help start this program back up with these guys.”

With everybody else struggling to score early, Delk got the Tigers off to a 6-0 lead in the first three minutes. The Longhorns (15-14) tied it briefly late in the half, but two free throws by Delk and a putback by sophomore Rylan Creighton — Elida’s first field goal from someone other than Delk — made it 23-19 at halftime.

Logan, playing without scoring leader Dante Sanchez (22.4 ppg) due to an ejection in the team’s previous game, kept it close through most of the third period before the Tigers began to pull away. Elida finished the game on a 13-2 run over the final six minutes.

Delk has now scored 108 points in his last three games.

“He had a big game tonight,” Longhorns coach Kyle Griffiths said. “We threw about every defense we could at him, but he’s a good player.”

Junior guard Teagan Burton added 13 points for Elida, all but two in the second half. The Longhorns got 10 points each from freshman guard Michael Sena and junior center Wyatt Wright.

“They came to play,” Delk said of the Longhorns. “They’re a young team. They’re fun to play against, and they’re going to be good in the future.”

Free throw shooting was a big difference in the outcome. While Elida went 16-of-22 from the line for the game, the Longhorns converted just 2-of-10.

“That’s been an Achilles’ heel all year long,” Griffiths said. “It’s hard to lose your last game, but on the bright side we only lose one senior.”

The stage will begin to get even bigger this week for the Tigers, but Delk is looking forward to facing Maxwell.

“I know they’ve got a really good big guy,” he said. “We’re going to just try to prepare the best we can for them.”

Melrose 37, Dora 27 — At Melrose, the visiting Coyotes resorted to a slowdown game and kept the top-seeded Buffaloes within striking distance most of the way in a battle of District 6-1A rivals.

Two-time defending Class 1A champion Melrose (26-1) finally pulled away in the fourth period, outscoring No. 16 seed Dora 13-6 — all at the free throw line (13-for-17).

“They did a good job of taking care of the ball; we couldn’t turn them over,” Melrose boys coach Kevin Lackey said of the Coyotes (13-14). “They had a good game plan for us.”

Senior guard Dylan Valentine led the Buffs with 10 points. Senior guard Joe Urioste was Dora’s high scorer with eight.

Melrose now faces ninth-seeded Quemado (20-8), coached by Lackey’s brother David, in a 4:45 p.m. quarterfinal today at Bernalillo. It’s the third year in a row that the teams have met in the state playoffs, with the Buffs beating the Eagles in the 2018 quarterfinals and in last year’s semifinals.

Quemado advanced on Saturday with a 55-51 win at eighth-seeded Grady.