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Local Sports
In a game of horrendous shooting performances, the Raiders overcame a six-point fourth-quarter deficit to defeat the Criminals 36-34 in overtime Thursday night at the Palace on Prison Hill. With the win, Cibola secured the No. 2 seed and home-court advantage through the first two rounds of next week's Gila Valley Region Tournament. "We came up with a little wrinkle in our zone and I thought they had a little trouble adjusting to it in the first half," Cibola coach Gary Abercrombie said. "Offensively, we couldn't get anything to go down but our defense did really well and kept us in the game." For much of the game, neither team looked like it could throw a pea in the ocean. The Raiders (13-14 overall, 5-3 Gila Valley) shot only 4-for-20 (20 percent) from the field in the first half. Yuma (9-17 overall, 4-4 Gila Valley), however, couldn't capitalize. The Criminals went 5-for-17 (29.4 percent) in the half and only managed a 10-9 edge at the break. "I was afraid everybody was going to leave at halftime. At 10-9, I thought maybe me and Gary were going to have to shoot free throws to see who was going to win the game," Yuma coach Louie Pisano said. "It was probably a game the fans might like to watch, especially the second half and the overtime, but it wasn't much good for the coaches." The Criminals opened up a five-point lead with 1:20 to play in the game, but Cibola junior Zac Downing canned a 3-pointer to pull the Raiders to within 26-24. Then Nick Herrera's steal and feed to Jeff Aldama in transition with 53 seconds remaining forced overtime. Cibola went ahead by six in the extra period on Downing's baseline drive, but Yuma fought back and trimmed the deficit to 35-34 when Ellis Maske knifed his way inside with 23 seconds left in overtime. The Criminals had a couple chances to tie or win in the waning seconds. Trailing by two, Cibola trapped Maske in the corner and forced an errant pass that Aldama intercepted with nine seconds left. But Aldama couldn't seal the game at the foul line, missing a pair. Yuma had one last shot with 1.7 seconds left, but the Raiders forced the sideline out-of-bounds pass to go to Patrick Caswell well beyond the arc and his desperate heave fell off the mark. Downing led all players with 19 points. Aldama scored all nine of his points in the second half. Harvey Callaway paced Yuma with 12, while Gabe Lorona pitched in 11. "It was just two teams playing hard — scrambling, scratching around," Abercrombie said. "I don't know how good a basketball it was, but it was an awful good effort by both teams." Derrik Miller can be reached at dmiller@yumasun.com or 782-6520.  |
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