RIO RANCHO — To get a shot at the state's best Class AAA boys basketball team, the St. Michael's Horsemen first had to beat the state's best Class AAA football team.

In a physical game that would have been better suited for the gridiron, the fifth-seeded Horsemen survived No. 4 Lovington, a team with several players who last fall won the Class AAA football championship, with a 65-57 win in the Santa Ana Star Center.

The win gets St. Michael's a shot at No. 1 Albuquerque Hope Christian in a Friday semifinal at 1:15 p.m. in The Pit. It will be a rematch of last year's Class AAA championship.

"They're a very athletic, very physical basketball team," St. Michael's head coach Ron Geyer said. "That's the way all Lovington teams have been since I moved to New Mexico in the early 1980s."

The physical style didn't seem to phase the Horsemen nearly as much as the Wildcats had hoped.

St. Michael's used a 10-0 run in the second quarter to take a 12-point lead at 22-10 with 3 minutes, 7 seconds remaining.

Lovington (23-5) clawed back into the game on several occasions, even pulling within one at 26-25 with 4 minutes, 24 seconds to play in the third quarter, but the Horsemen kept their cool and converted at the free-throw line repeatedly down the stretch to keep the Wildcats frustrated.

The constant banging drew the ire of Horsemen (20-10) fans throughout the game and led to the Horsemen shooting 25 more free throws than the Wildcats, who were called for 26 fouls and had three starters — Jacob Jameson, Robert Hargrove and Jaden Swenson — foul out.

St. Michael's was 25 of 37 from the free-throw line, including 19 of 25 in the fourth quarter.

Lovington shot just 12 free throws in the game, making 10.

Horsemen senior Patrick Griswold hit 8 of 9 from the charity stripe and was one of three Horsemen in double figures, scoring 10 points.

Junior guard Wesley Vaughan had a team-high 12 and David Gonzalez scored 11.

"It just killed our momentum," Lovington head coach Stephen Bridgforth said of the free-throw disparity. "Especially when you're talking about a single-digit game. That's a tough stat."

While the stat may have been hard for Bridgforth to take, so too for Horsemen fans was it seeing starting sophomore point guard Antonio Garcia leave the game with a possible concussion after a second quarter collision near midcourt that led to a Hargrove steal and layup.

"They got the ball, but they went through him," Geyer said. "That's how I saw it."

Garcia is questionable for Friday's semifinal against the Huskies, a team the Horsemen have wanted to play again since last year's state title loss.

"They've been in the back of my mind," Griswold said.

Swenson, who admitted he was frustrated by not getting a crack at the Huskies himself, had a quick, and blunt answer to a reporter's question about whether St. Michael's has a chance at upsetting Hope Christian.

"No," Swenson said.

After a long pause, his coach chimed in with a more typical, and political answer.

"That's why you play it," Bridgforth said.

And that's all Geyer and the Horsemen can ask for.

Contact Geoff Grammer at ggrammer@sfnewmexican.com or 986-3060. Read his blog
at grammerschoolblog.com.