Silva Scores 52

By Nicky Romero
For the Mountain Mail

The third-ranked Socorro Lady Warriors Basketball Team (17-5, 3-0) won their second road district game of the season. Socorro defeated Cobre High School 68-23 on Friday, Feb. 5.
“Cobre (3-19, 0-2) is a young and inexperienced team,” Socorro coach Joseph Garcia said. “After the first quarter, we were ahead 33-6. The rest of the way we only made 35 points, but we still ended up by winning by 45 points.”
“All the girls got to play so that was the good news. After a hard week of practice, it was good to reward these kids with some playing time.”
Roxanne Silva poured in 41 points and grabbed 13 rebounds. She also broke Charity Savedra's 1999 individual game record of 11 steals. Silva had 12.
Jaden Jones had 7 points and 7 rebounds. Kianna Gonzales also contributed 7 points. Point guard Tristen Peralta played well and distributed the ball, with only two turnovers, five assists and 5 steals.
The Lady Warriors were tested at home on Tuesday, Feb. 9 against the Hatch Valley Lady Bears but passed the test 83-54. Socorro is now in sole possession of first place in district with a 3-0 record, with three games remaining. Hatch Valley fell to 6-14 and 1-2 in district.
The state's leading scorer, Silva, broke Audra Major's school record of 47 points in a single game by finishing with 52. Many of her points came from assists by Tristen Peralta, Jaden Jones, Samantha Sedillo, and Brittany McDaniel.
“Roxanne played big again,” Garcia said. “I knew she had a lot of points, but I didn't realize she had that many close to the record. I was going to sub her out and than she had 47 to tie it, so she wanted to stay in. She ended up by getting five more points. She's been wanting to break this record. She has every other record there is, so she might has as well have that one too.”
But both teams battled back and forth in the first half. Hatch began the game playing man-to-man defense, confident in trying to contain Silva. But Silva terrorized the inside of the paint all night and scored 25 points in the half.
Garcia commented on the first half, “It started off real tough. I knew it would be. They're a little bit taller than us in every position. I think the problem we had in the 1st half was we gave up 22 points on layups on the top of our press. And the key to this game I told the girls before the game was rebounding. In the 1st, half, they outrebounded us, because they were getting 2nd and 3rd shots.
So we just had to change personnel in the back of the press.”
Garcia was pleased with the victory, “This was a big victory for us. We're now 3-0 in district, which is important. So we're in good shape going into our last three district games.”
Hatch Valley's 1st year coach Sara Davis said, “We got in foul trouble early, so we had to go with a smaller lineup. We had a hard time keeping them off the boards. They kind of wore us down after awhile. We had a great first half, than they just blew it open in the second half.”
Socorro's Jaden Jones and Brittany McDaniel had 8 points apiece.
For Hatch, Jessica Gomez had 18 points, Rebecca Hays had 14 points, and Kelcie Carson had 12 points.
Socorro plays Cobre at home on Feb. 12 and Hot Springs at home on Feb. 16.

Silva Scores 52