Clovis boys finish as second seed

CLOVIS — It was going to be a game after all.

When the Clovis boys basketball team kept a double-digit lead over Carlsbad for much of Tuesday night’s contest at Clovis High’s Rock Staubus Gymnasium, it seemed the Wildcats would maintain an arm’s-length advantage the rest of the way.

But Carlsbad had other ideas and stormed back to make it a two-point game in the fourth quarter. That seemed to ignite the ’Cats again and they went on a run, enabling them to pull away for a 58-41 victory on Senior Night at Staubus Gym.

“Games are going to be dogfights in district,” Clovis head coach Jaden Isler said. “So we knew it was a four-quarter game, and I thought for the majority of the game our kids played really well.”

Clovis fell Friday night at Roswell, 57-54 in overtime, eliminating the possibility of a tiebreaker game for the top seed. Instead, Clovis will host either Roswell or Carlsbad Thursday, with the winner visiting the Eagles on Saturday. Efforts to contact Isler regarding the Roswell game were unsuccessful.

“This is really big. This adds another win to our plate,” Wildcats senior guard Dewayne Dawson said Tuesday after scoring seven of his team-high 14 points in the crucial fourth quarter.

The Wildcats improved to 18-7 overall, 4-1 district, keeping them in the race to either win the regular-season district championship or at least tie Hobbs for it.

Carlsbad, meanwhile, dropped to a still-respectable 14-11 overall, but 0-5 in district play.

“Before district we had a nice little record; I think we were 14-6,” Carlsbad head coach Steve Garza said. “And we’ve lost five in a row in district, so we’re struggling a little bit right now. Our district’s tough, but we’re fighting hard. We have a chance in every game, so anything can happen in the last week or two.”

Clovis led 9-1 during Tuesday’s first quarter, 16-4 by that quarter’s end, 29-19 at halftime, 36-22 during the third period.

But, Carlsbad then came alive, sparked by a Trai Calderon foul shot and Andrew Miller’s right-arc trey that began an 11-3 run to end the third.

Miller’s three-point basket was soon followed by two foul shots from teammate Shamar Smith, which were quickly followed by a three from Clovis’ Malik Phillips, all resulting in a 39-28 Wildcats lead.

A reverse lay-in by Calderon brought Carlsbad within nine late in the period, and after the Cavemen reclaimed possession with the quarter’s last few seconds fading, they hustled downcourt and Miller launched a three from the left elbow that looked like it may have been shot a half-second after the buzzer. Or, the shot could have just beaten the buzzer, it was that close.

The referees decided on the latter, awarding the basket to Miller and making it a 39-33 game at the end of three quarters.

Clovis’ bench strongly disagreed with the call at the time.

“The three, it’s up to the official’s judgment,” Isler said later. “I knew that was going to make us have to really get off to a good start going into the fourth.”

However, it was Carlsbad not Clovis getting off to that good start in the fourth quarter. After the Cavemen surrendered the fourth’s opening possession when it was ruled that Riley Hestand had stepped out of bounds, his teammate Ayden Parent came up with a steal that resulted in a fast-break lay-in for Hestand, narrowing Carlsbad’s deficit to just 39-35.

Clovis’ next possession saw Josiah Lombrana at the foul line for two, but the normally steady-eddy Lombrana’s attempts wouldn’t fall. And then on Carlsbad’s next possession begun by a Smith defensive rebound, two Cavemen misses were followed up by a third-chance basket from Hestand, slicing the margin to just 39-37 with roughly six minutes still to play in the fourth quarter.

Timeout Clovis. Time for the Wildcats to collect themselves.

“I thought we got a little bit lax there,” Isler said. “We had a decent-sized lead … and I thought we got a little bit loose. Defensively we weren’t boxing out; we gave them some second-chance points and then had a turnover too before I called the timeout. So I thought we just loosened up a little bit right there at that point in the game.”

But when play resumed, so did the energy and tempo Clovis had displayed before the Carlsbad run. On the Wildcats’ first possession after the timeout, Dawson swooped around the right side and hit a bank shot that gave his team a 41-37 edge.

After a Carlsbad miss on the other end, Wildcats senior center Bryce Cabeldue hit a fast-break layup, and after another miss by the Cavemen, Cabeldue followed up with a putback after a Dawson runner wouldn’t drop.

Carlsbad was called for an offensive foul on its next possession, and Dawson hit a field goal on the other end. Just that quickly, Clovis was back up by double digits, 47-37.

“I thought our kids did a great job coming out of the timeout,” Isler said. “We re-focused and we went right back to doing what we were doing. So, good response by our kids.”

“We have to play the whole game hard, instead of having those lags in the fourth quarter,” Dawson said. “That’s what we really need to fix, the second half.”

The Wildcats’ run wasn’t over. A pair of Mason Figueroa free throws made it a 12-point game with 3:13 remaining in the fourth, and a left-corner three from Malik Phillips pushed the lead to 52-37 with a little more than two minutes left.

Finally with 1:50 to go, Miller hit a runner that ended Carlsbad’s drought. But it was way too late, Clovis was firmly in command.

“I was proud of our kids,” Garza said. “We cut it to 39-37, got it within two. Hats off to Clovis; they just turned it up a notch. We had some good looks when it was within reach. We just didn’t knock them down; that’s part of the game. I wish Clovis luck the rest of the way, but I’m proud of our boys for battling the whole time.”