Without question it was the toughest league road trip the Mineral County Serpents had this season and both the boys and girls teams came away with two losses, at Pahranagat Valley and at Lund.

Friday night’s stop was in Alamo to face Pahranagat Valley. And a rough and tumble game it was with fine play from players on both sides.

The Serpents, who had beaten the Panthers their previous two meetings, came out on the short end this time, losing 58-48. Interestingly enough that was not too far off from the 59-50 score Mineral County won by when the teams played in Hawthorne Jan. 14. The Alamo win now ties the series between the teams at 7 apiece since 2005.

The score was tied at 13 after the first period, but the Panthers, with a heavy home crowd on hand, turned up the offense in the second quarter and outscored the Serpents 17 to 8 to take a 30-21 halftime lead.

Pahranagat’s forward Paul Lewis made nine of his game high 23 points that quarter and added to Kobi Fiatoa with a total of 12 points and Roger Wilson 13 points,. they made it tough for the Serpents to penetrate much inside to the basket.

Guards DeVayne Isom and Isaac Torres led the scoring for Mineral County. Isom had 11 points and Torres had 10. Andre White also had 10 points for MCHS.

Coach Summerbell said, “It was a very good game. We did climb back within three points, but had about seven possessions where we took three bad shots, and they got rebounds, scored and opened it back up. We just didn’t execute when we had our chances.” He added, “We are definitely looking forward to seeing them again,” which might very likely be in the regional finals Feb. 19 in Tonopah.

The Saturday game on the road trip was to Lund where the Mustangs surprised the Serpents with a 74-54 loss. Using a strong second half, Lund outscored MCHS 44-34. It was only the second time the teams had played since Lund has not had basketball for about the past five years, but has now put together a formidable squad.

Mineral County had four starters foul out in the game. And the Lund group had a total of 42 foul shots, numbers not reported, and the Serpents went to the foul line only eight times.

Summerbell said Lund’s Jackson Griffin had a terrific game with 27 points. For MCHS DeVayne Isom led the team with 18 points. Tristen Jones, in coming off the bench, contributed 13 points and Andre White tallied 12.

This Saturday Mineral County will host Beatty. It will also be Senior Day for all the senior boys and girls on the varsity teams.

Then on Tuesday, Feb. 15, the Serpents travel to Tonopah for a makeup game. Interestingly, the 1A Central Regional tourney will be held at Tonopah Feb. 18-19.

That moves Lund (13-5, 7-2) into second place in the league, and drops the Serpents (13-6, 6-2) to third place. The Mustangs played at Pahranagat Valley (19-4, 7-1) on Tuesday this week.

The Lady Serpents also lost both games on the road trip 48-14 at Pahranagat Valley and 49-25 at Lund.

Only three players for Mineral County (0-8, 1-15) scored in the game at Alamo. Hayle Dalton had six points, Raenea Johnson had five points and Faylynn Wedekind had three points.

No stats were posted for the girl’s game with second place Lund (8-6, 7-2). The girls finish up their season with a home game with Beatty this Saturday and a game at Tonopah Feb. 15.