KC, Gallup girls post lopsided wins in opening round
Lady Chieftains upset No. 6 Bernalillo

WINDOW ROCK

The girls Class 4A quarterfinals are set, with the top four seeds – Kirtland Central, Gallup, Albuquerque Academy and Hope Christian – posting 20-plus-point wins on Friday night.

Top-ranked KC (26-3) pulled away from No. 16 Roswell Goddard (15-13) in the second quarter as the Lady Broncos advanced with a 61-40 win.

“Overall, I was pretty satisfied with what we did,” KC coach Devon Manning said. “Goddard was a lot more athletic and quicker than what the film showed, so they kind of got us on our heels a little bit. But once we got our defense rolling, and when we started hitting some shots it went well from there.”

KC led 14-9 after the first quarter, but Goddard got as close as 20-16 on a basket by senior forward Natalie Hardwick with 5:07 left in the second stanza.

The Broncos closed the quarter on a 15-1 run that started with a 3-pointer from junior guard Elaina Clani, who finished with a team-best 18 points.

“She played a pretty good ball game tonight,” Manning said of Clani. “She had been struggling the last few weeks and so it was good to see her come out like the way she did.”

The Broncos also got 15 points from Allyson Tsosie as KC opened a 50-20 cushion heading into the fourth.

“We had a pretty good run to end the first half, and we kept that momentum going in the third, and we got up by 30 points,” Manning said. “Those two middle quarters, we picked it up offensively and defensively.”

In the next round, KC will match up with No. 9 Lovington at 3 p.m. Tuesday at The Pit on the University of New Mexico campus.

Lovington defeated No. 8 Portales 41-40 on the road.

“It’ll be another tough one,” Manning said of Lovington. “They have a really good guard (Ashelynn Borunda) who is averaging 24 points per game. They have a big (Abbi Shouse) who is 6-foot-5, so we got a new challenge.”

At Gallup High School, the second-seeded Lady Bengals opened a 10-0 lead and never looked back in a 68-38 win.

“I thought we came out and we played hard,” Gallup coach Todd McBroom said. “We got after them, and we turned them over to start the game. We finished well around the basket, so it was a good game for us.”

Gallup was led by senior Camira Cooper-Randles with a team-high 12 points. Junior guards Mykeia Vicenti and Payton Johnson added 10 points apiece, and junior post Kayden Tsosie added nine.

“I thought Camira Cooper-Randles had a really good game on both sides of the ball,” McBroom said. “She got a lot of deflections on the defensive side, and she finished well, so she played really well of the bench.”

Pojoaque Valley was led by junior Monique Arrietta, who led all scorers with 15 points.

“They’re a scrappy team,” McBroom said of Pojoaque Valley. “They’re not a bad team. I think it’s one of those things where they had a tough game to start the tournament with us.”

Up next for Gallup is No. 7 Silver, which advanced with a 53-47 win over No. 10 Albuquerque Highland.

Earlier this season, Gallup beat Silver twice during the Gallup Invite and the Clovis tournament, winning 70-35 and 66-41, respectively.

“They’re not a bad team,” McBroom said. “The coach’s daughter (Taylianna Castillo) is a tough guard. She has some size to her, and she’s quick off the dribble and she shoots well.”

The Gallup coach said Silver has five other players who can pick up the slack, but the team does not have much depth.

“It’s hard when you have six players and that’s the problem they had when they ran into us,” McBroom said. “They’re just not very deep like we are.”

In other first-round games, No. 11 Shiprock upset No. 6 Bernalillo by a 53-45 count.

“I’m surprise by it, but at the same time I’m not surprise by it,” McBroom said of Shiprock’s win. “Bernalillo won over 20 games this year, but if you look at their schedule and their results, they won a lot of close games, and those games could have easily flipped the other direction. They could have easily been a 14-win team, so it didn’t surprise me. They just had the ball bounce their way, and I think tonight it must have not bounced their way.”

Shiprock will play No. 3 Academy on Tuesday at 11:30 a.m. after the Lady Chargers took care of No. 14 Espanola Valley, 48-20.

Hope Christian, the tournament’s No. 4 seed, advanced with a 47-25 win over No. 13 Grants. The Huskies will take on No. 5 Valencia on Tuesday at 8 a.m. On Friday, Valencia beat No. 13 St. Pius X 43-40.

Get instant access to this story by purchasing one of our many e-edition subscriptions HERE at our Navajo Times Store.

---