It took a half of basketball for the Ignacio Bobcats to recover from heartbreak.
After battling past 10 p.m. in overtime of a state quarterfinal against Holyoke and coming up on the wrong end of a 61-60 result, the Ignacio High School boys basketball team had a quick turnaround for a consolation game against No. 8 Ellicott (18-6) it would’ve rather not played.
No. 5 Ignacio (22-3) came out slow, trailing 10-4 after one quarter and 33-24 at halftime, but the Bobcats came back to life in the second half to claim a 73-55 victory and advance to the fifth-place game of the Colorado High School Activities Association Class 2A Boys Basketball State Tournament.
“It was a total turnaround,” IHS head coach Chris Valdez said of the team’s second-half performance. “It took us half a game to get over the loss from (Thursday). We won’t downplay it. That loss was debilitating. We expect to come up here and win and, when you don’t, it hurts. The kids were hurt, the coaches were hurt, the fans were hurt. It’s really hard on us.”
Valdez said the team didn’t get back to the hotel until 11:45 p.m. and had to get some food and get right to bed for a 9 a.m. wake-up call Friday.
After coming out understandably flat in the first half Friday, the Bobcats spread the floor and cranked up the intensity.
“We opened it up and attacked the basket for easy layups late in the game,” Valdez said. “People took turns attacking. The kids fed off each other. The color came back in their faces, and the old Bobcats were back.”
Ignacio claimed the lead at 41-39 with 3 minutes, 43 seconds to go in the third quarter thanks to a Joaquin King 3-pointer. The Bobcats never relinquished the lead from there.
Wyatt Hayes bounced back from a six-point effort against Holyoke in the quarterfinals with 21 points, nine steals and eight rebounds. Tucker Ward scored 20 points and grabbed nine rebounds, and Anthony Manzanares went for 16 points, seven rebounds, two assists and two steals.
Austin McCaw also scored seven points, all in the fourth quarter. Nicholas Herrera led the Bobcats with 11 rebounds to go with six points.
After falling in the semifinals the previous two years and claiming third place, the Bobcats will play for fifth this year against a tough and tall Paonia squad it beat in the regional championship in 2015. Paonia beat Rye 65-59 in the other consolation semifinal Friday. The fifth-place game will tip off at 11:30 a.m. Saturday in Pueblo.
“They have one guy that is like 6-foot-7. Big, long and talented,” Valdez said of Saturday’s opponent. “They’ll be a challenge. They were tough last year, and they didn’t lose anybody, so they’ve improved a lot.”
jlivingston@durangoherald.com
