In their latest road trip, this time to the City of Vision for the Rio Rancho Girls Basketball Invitational, the Española Valley High School girls basketball team came away with a 1-2 record, but have found their true identity moving forward.
The Lady Sundevils (4-5) played three games Dec. 13-15 at Rio Rancho High School and fell to Belen High School 44-43 in overtime in the opening round, defeated Albuquerque High School 53-43 and lost in the waning seconds to Las Cruces High School 42-38.
“We really seem to have these peaks and valleys to us,” Española head coach Joe Estrada said. “We started quick and got up by 10 or 12 points (against Belen), but we seemed to relax a little bit. We had three good shots at the basket in our last possession in overtime but couldn’t get any of them to go in and then the clock ran out.”
Through the first seven games of the season, Española had dabbled with a ¾-court press, but changed to a full-court press on the final two days of the tournament.
The strategy worked to a tee in their 53-43 win over Albuquerque, frustrating and wearing down the Lady Bulldogs and Estrada said it was the key takeaway from the weekend.
“What I’m most happy about I think is, we found our identity,” he said. “We’re gonna be that full-court press kind of team. We were iffy about things, wondering if this team is too good to press or that team is too good to press, but I think we found our identity. We’re gonna get at it from here on forward and that seems to be the best way these kids play basketball.”
Kaylinn Martinez — who was named to the all-tournament team — sure thought so. The senior led the Lady Sundevils with 10 points in the final game against the Class 5A Lady Bulldawgs from Las Cruces (5-3), but said it was defense that carried her and her teammates over the weekend.
“I turned the ball over a lot and got into some foul trouble,” Martinez said. “I had to play good defense to get my offense going and the other girls were playing even better defense, so a lot of the times they (other teams) couldn’t even get the ball past half court.”
Like her coach, Martinez said she sees good things to come with the change of strategy despite the teams 4-5 record thus far.
“It’s all you can give on defense for 10 seconds, right there,” she said. “ Everyone liked it and it worked and we hadn’t done a full-court press all year until the last two days. Our guards are really good defenders and they’re quick, so it should make a difference.”
After scoring in double-digits the first three quarters against Las Cruces, the Lady Sundevils fell into a slump in the fourth and Kaylee Chavez’s 3-point basket with 1:40 left to bring Española within 39-38 was the only bucket of the quarter.
Martinez scored seven of her 10 points in the first half, but she was unable to convert on a mid-range jump shot and a drive to the basket on Española’s final two possessions with a chance to take the lead within the last 30 seconds.
“I got the ball with about 13 seconds left and the first thing I thought was to drive and get a foul, make it or at least attempt to make it,” Martinez said about the final possession. “It fell short and even the possession before I had a jump shot and it went in-and-out. But, you can’t make them all, right.”
Las Cruces converted on their final four free throw attempts to seal the victory.
In their matchup with the Lady Bulldogs (1-5) from 5A’s Albuquerque, Chavez led the charge with 27 points and scored 11 of the team’s 17 points in the fourth quarter.
Estrada usually doesn’t like to single out any individual performances, but his senior guard had him ready to talk on that day.
“I would love to talk about Kaylee today,” he said. “I thought she had a rough night last night (against Belen), and in the locker room and at dinner she vocalized some things that were bothering her. They necessarily didn’t have to do with the team, but getting that out of her system really got her confidence back and I told coach (Ida) Valencia on the bus today that Kaylee is gonna have a big game and she sure did.”
Española used the momentum built from their suffocating press in the final minute of the first half, as they took their first lead of the game at 23-22 off a Chavez 3-pointer with 1:08 left after trailing 18-11 earlier in the quarter.
The Lady Sundevils held Albuquerque’s Vanessa Baca to two free throws in the fourth quarter after she had scored 15 points throughout the first three quarters. Martinez and Erika Medina-Cole both added six points as the second-leading scorers behind Chavez.
Española had to right the ship with the absence of sophomore guard Anita DeAguero, who stayed home over the weekend due to an illness. She is one of several sophomores who get a majority of the minutes, and Estrada knows it will still take a little more time for the confidence to blossom among the young group.
“I’ve said it before, we’re young, we’re inexperienced and we’re still working on our confidence,” he said. “But, our kids are in a real positive place and they seem upbeat all the time.”