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Home / News / Surprise, Pecos senior Ismael Villegas failed to make varsity basketball until his junior year, but that’s all history as he continued his sparkling two seasons with a stellar effort in Friday night’s 58-54 win over 5A Clovis

Surprise, Pecos senior Ismael Villegas failed to make varsity basketball until his junior year, but that’s all history as he continued his sparkling two seasons with a stellar effort in Friday night’s 58-54 win over 5A Clovis

By Arnie Leshin 
Arnie Leshin

It was the usual full house at Pecos High’s Louis G. Sanchez Memorial gymnasium and Elissa Villegas appeared concerned as she returned to her seat for the second half as the boy’s basketball game’s official scorer.

The 2A Panthers were up 34-33 in this non district challenge against 5A Clovis. Small school versus big school, just another time to see Ira Hodge, Jr.’s team go up against a school with over a thousand more students, and up until now had already disposed of 4A Bernalillo in the Stu Clark tournament final and also tack on three other 4A victims.
As for Elissa Villegas, she wasn’t upset, wasn’t all that concerned, she was just talking out loud in praise of her son, 6-foot-3 junior post Ismael Villegas. “My son, my son,” she said to no one in particular.
 
Then she took her scorebook in hand and her son took over the close contest.
 
And for someone who couldn’t make the varsity until his junior year, he was mom’s pride and joy as he settled inside to score and haul down rebounds in Friday night‘s exciting 58-54 success over the bigger, more physical Wildcats. 
 
This upped Hodge’s team record to 17-1, and notch its 100th win in what is the fourth season following three-straight state championships in 3A and 2A. Over that stretch, the Panthers went 83-7, now they are 100-8 heading into Saturday night‘s non district game at Espanola McCurdy. 
 
The young Villegas, who had the game-high 25 points and scrubbed the boards for nine rebounds, well, according to his mom and scoreboard official Audra Valencia, Ismael tried out for basketball as a freshman, but could only find a spot on the junior varsity. The same his sophomore season, JV again.
“I just didn’t have the experience then,” he said after the game. “but I really wanted to play varsity and I worked on it. I lifted weights, got stronger, gained more experience, and made varsity.”
 
Senior teammate starters Xavier Padilla and Anthony Armijo had played in the initial state final win over district rival Santa Rosa as freshmen, and again in the state championship triumph over previously undefeated district foe Texico. But Villegas was then a spectator rooting for his team.
 
Last year, he made it to the final and he, Padilla and Armijo sparked another title run by disposing of once-beaten Newcombe, except this time Ismael was playing, being a part of it.
 
“I’ve just gotten better because I’ve worked on it,” he said. “During the summer, I played AAU ball in Nevada with some of the players from Cleveland High School (Rio Rancho Cleveland), and I was eager to have a big senior year.”
 
He has more confidence now, he has more interest in playing college ball, with his main thoughts on Division I University of New Mexico State and majoring in engineering. 
 
And in getting past 14-6 Clovis, his mom was having an easy time filling up the Pecos scoring. Ismael had eight points after one quarter, had 10 at intermission, 14 after three quarters, and really turned it on in the hectic final eight minutes. 
 
It was back-and-forth lead changes, several ties, but Villegas was set for the moments. So was his mom as she entered his name with a underneath basket and a free throw at 6:40 to force a 46-all tie. Next, with 4:49 and 3:37 to go, she inserted back-to-back Ismael inside buckets for a 52-49 advantage following a  jumper from senior Juan Varela. 
 
With 2:03 remaining, there was number 40 again, parked underneath the basket to turn a rebound into converting a pair of foul shots and the lead was 56-51. Quickly, a stolen ball by Varela pushed the ball into Ismael’s hands under the nets and he laid in another two and the lead became 56-51. 
 
The Wildcats got to within 56-54 on a charity toss and bucket, and then got the ball back on a Pecos turnover with 22.6 seconds left and called a timeout. They had trouble moving the ball down court and called their final timeout. But with 0:6.3 to go, their senior point guard Dwayne Dawson was trying to put the ball in play, but was bothered by the aggressive defense of Padilla.
 
Five-second call rang out, the home crowd exploded, and just as quickly Dawson fouled Varela, who stepped to the line and calmly made both freebies for the final score and the celebration.
Said Villegas: “This was one of my better games because it was very physical, it was a close game, and I really had to control the inside.”
 
In the locker room, happy Hodge congratulated his youngsters, praised the entire team, mentioned their offense, their defense, and their team play that forced Clovis into 26 turnovers of mostly walks, being out-of-bounds, and 3 and 5-second calls. 
 
Most of the fouls were called against the visitors, but Wildcats’ head coach Jaden Isler had no complaints. 
 
“It was a very physical game,” he said, “so there were a lot of close calls that went the other way, but we can accept it, it was quite a game that could have gone either way, but that number 40 had his way when it counted most.” 
 
Hodge’s final words to his team was to remind it to get some rest because it had this game the next night in the doubleheader at McCurdy. 
 
Clovis trailed 9-0 but took a 19-18 lead after one quarter. In the third stanza, a 3 by Varela and his stolen-ball layup put Pecos up 39-33, but the Wildcats trimmed it to 39-37. Next came 41 and 43-point deadlocks, but the visitors were on top 45-43 with eight minutes left.
 
Then it was Villegas time. He had a pair of baskets in the final minute of the third quarter then went to work in the fourth. His team made good on 9-of-11 foul tries, and Clovis was 7-for-12. The rebounds were equal, with the Panthers having two more. 
 
Villegas’ game high was 38 points scored in the 8-point loss to 5A Santa Fe High when he went up against the Demons’ 6-6 junior Fedonta “J.B.” White. He said he himself was about 6-feet his freshman and sophomore seasons. 
His dad, Sonny, played high school ball at Silver, was a guard who Ismael said was about 5-9 with two beers and socks. He added that basketball is one of his favorite sports and that he tossed the javelin, discus and shot put for the track and  field team, with the javelin, where he placed at state, his best throw and hopefully an even better senior season.  
 
The 6-1 Padilla, the team’s leading scorer, had 13 points, all in the first half, but he also picked up three fouls and was scoreless the second half but his defense was noteworthy, as was his dishing the ball and rebounding. Varela turned in a clutch 9 points, Armijo added five, included five assists, and senior Devin Gonzales, the school’s best cross country runner, contributed a basket. 
 
For Clovis, missing its 6-6 senior post Bryce Cabeldue, who was on a football recruiting trip to University of Kansas, received a team-high 15 points from junior Blake Muscato, a dozen from Dawson, 11 from seniors Ethan Gershon and Mason Figueroa, and five from senior Darion Morgan. 
 
Not to forget, the once postponed snowstorm non district game against undefeated Magdalena (17-0) will be played at Pecos Feb. 11. The Steers remain the state’s lone unbeaten boy’s team and Hobbs (18-0) is the lone girl’s team. 
 
. . . In other boy’s games Friday, Santa Fe High (14-3) won a 59-52 District 5-5A game at Albuquerque Sandia, and Capital (16-2) brought back a 59-47 win from district rival Albuquerque High. This put the Demons at 2-0 in district, and it plays next on Tuesday at Albuquerque Manzano. The Jaguars, also 2-0 in district, are at Sandia Tuesday.
 
It was Albuquerque Menaul overwhelming combined Desert Academy/Santa Fe Waldorf, 75-22, to drop the weary Wildcat Wolves to 1-10. In a Saturday contest, West Las Vegas hung a 2-3A setback on Santa Fe Indian School, 53-33. 
 
In girl’s games, it was St. Michael’s upping its overall record to 10-8 and 1-0 in 2-3A by romping over visiting Raton, 63-19, and the next stop is at Santa Fe Indian School Wednesday. In 2-4A, Pojoaque Valley (14-5, 2-0) had no problem rolling over Taos, 53-32, to drop the Tigers to 2-13 and 0-2.  
Academy of Technology and The Classics fell to visiting Maxwell, 42-35, and Menaul won for the first time in 14 starts by nipping Desert/Waldorf, 25-24, as the Wildcat Wolves lost their ninth of 10 starts.

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