Blanked for the opening 5:40 of play, Bayfield faced an uphill climb for most of the contest, until senior guard Cody Ross sank a difficult baseline jumper – while being fouled – with 6:51 left in the fourth, tying the score at 24.
Ignacio would answer and rebuild a 32-26 lead before Wolverine guard Cooper Roderick–IHS’ must-stop target – sank a clutch three-pointer with 3:41 to go. But with 2:09 remaining, sophomore post Vin McCullough, tasked with shadowing Bobcat big Gabe Cox, was called for his disqualifying fifth personal foul, allowing Ignacio to focus more intensely upon Roderick and fellow perimeter threat Kingston Martinez down the stretch.
“30 still hit two deep ones on us,” Ignacio head coach Chris Valdez noted, referring to Roderick “and that was just our people not responding and getting out on him. And they threw some screens on us to try to get those kids open, so I was excited about the fact that we were able to keep him from scoring four, five threes, you know? Number 30, Number 13 (Martinez) … we wanted to take that away.”
In the end, neither Roderick nor Martinez scored another point as the duo managed just eight points (all by Roderick) combined in a 42-33 road loss. McCullough ended up with a team-leading nine points, Ross registered seven before fouling out with 28.3 ticks left.
Ignacio improved to 6-5 overall and 2-1 in the 3A/4A Intermountain with the win while Bayfield fell to 1-10 overall and 0-3 in the IML.
Sophomore Ambrose Valdez’s corner three-pointer late in the first quarter put Ignacio up 10-3 going into the second, and the Bobcats’ lead quickly grew to a dangerous 17-6 with 6:00 left until halftime when senior Trajan Garcia sank two technical-foul free throws – awarded due to BHS’ Chad Vasgird checked in without having been entered prior to tipoff in the official score book.
The Wolverines however, fought back with an 11-2 burst bringing them back to 19-17 at intermission, after Roderick stole the ball, passed to Williams, who then passed ahead to McCullough for a close-range hoop.
“Their 2-3 (zone defense) stifled us for a while and they crawled back into the game,” Valdez said. “And I then talked about the first three minutes of that third quarter being our best three minutes, and we got a nice seven-point lead which really helped us keep them in check.”
With Cox scoring five fast points, the Bobcats went up 24-17 with 4:52 left in the third before Williams made a short jumper after gathering in a Roderick three-point miss. But with 1:10 remaining, IHS junior Coty Webb responded with a corner three off a Cox kick-out pass, and senior Phillip Quintana followed with a runner in the paint – increasing Ignacio’s lead to 29-19 before BHS junior Austin Wilmer canned a corner three at the buzzer.
All told, Cox finished with a game-high 16 points and grabbed (unofficially) 15 rebounds. Garcia (4-4 FT) and Valdez (2-6 FT) each totaled seven points, Quintana contributed five. From the charity stripe, IHS ended up 14-of-23 and BHS 6-of-11.
“The kids played hard,” Valdez said. “We made some mistakes – tons of mistakes – and there’s stuff we’ve got to work on, but I thought we did a good enough job to get the win – which was all we wanted to do.”
The Bobcats are slated to next see action Friday, Jan. 26, in La Jara at Centauri. Bayfield, meanwhile, was to host Pagosa Springs on the 20th, with the 4A Pirates (12-1, 3-0) having won 53-43 at 4A Alamosa (8-4, 1-2) the night before.
