(Mission, Texas)-On Monday night, the University Interscholastic League 5A Bi-District Girls Basketball playoffs tipped off on Valentine’s Day with the 32-5A champions Brownsville Veterans Memorial Lady Chargers (29-7) defeating 31-5A fourth place team, Sharyland Pioneer 74-28 (17-18) to advance to the area championships this weekend. The Lady Chargers will meet La Joya Palmview or Flour Bluff. “I’m real proud of this team tonight. We played great defense,” said head coach Arnold Torres Jr, Brownsville Veterans Memorial HS. “Offensively, we came out strong.”
Both teams came out strong with four three-pointers and the Lady Chargers quickly made their adjustments to make it 6-6 all. The Lady Diamondbacks took the lead after Soleil Ashley was fouled. She would hit her two bonus shots to make it 8-6 for the Lady Diamondbacks. The Lady Chargers responded with three-pointers by Bryanna Buitureira and Alexa Torres to go up 16-8 with 3:30 left in the first period. Both players would do it again to put the Lady Chargers up for good 22-8 with 1:04 still left in the first period. The half ended with the Lady Chargers up 36-10.
In the second half, whatever Torres told his team in the visitor’s locker room, the Lady Chargers came out charging with plenty of defense, holding Pioneer to just three points as they increased their lead to 52-13 at the end of the third period. Jordan Bravo from Sharyland Pioneer HS, only a sophomore, was held to eleven points for the night while Brownsville Veterans Memorial HS junior Marina Espinoza and senior Caite Esquivel both lead the game with 17 points each. Junior Alex Torres added another 15 points, including four three-pointers and senior Bryanna Buitureira added another 12 points.
