For Luke Salazar, a streak of five-straight losses to the St. Michael's Horsemen is growing real tiresome.

He's lucky it's only in his second year on varsity.

Salazar's Pojoaque Valley Elks went cold on offense in the second half of Thursday's District 2AAA basketball game in Perez-Shelley Gymnasium and the host Horsemen cruised to a 45-38 win, their 16th straight over the Elks.

"We came into this game thinking this would be the one," said Salazar, a junior guard who had a game-high 18 points. "We come into every game with St. Mike's thinking we'll beat them. We don't talk about how long it's been since we beat them, but I'm sure it's in the back of everyone's mind."

When Salazar calmly sank a pair of free throws with 2 minutes, 7 seconds remaining in the game to cut St. Michael's lead to 39-38, the game and the streak were still in doubt.

But the Horsemen (12-9, 3-2 2AAA) didn't allow Pojoaque (14-7, 3-2) to score again and sophomore Colin Friedman, enjoying the best game of his Horsemen career, scored the next four points to ice the outcome.

"I think this was a real good game for the whole team," said the 6-foot-4 Friedman, who blocked five shots, grabbed eight rebounds and scored six points. "Every game in district is a tough game and we had to work hard to win this one."

Pojoaque held a 22-21 halftime lead when the Horsemen opened the second half in what appeared to be a very basic 2-3 zone defense.

Looks can be deceiving.

Despite head coach Ron Geyer's propensity to change up defenses multiple times a quarter, if not within a single possession, the Horsemen stayed in the zone because it was painfully obvious the Elks couldn't solve it.

St. Michael's, with Friedman's shot blocking threat in the paint, held the Elks without a basket for the first 7:09 of the third quarter and just four second-half baskets, two of which came off Salazar steals leading to fast-break layups.

The Elks' final basket from their half-court offense came when Tom Nakotte hit a shot in the paint while being fouled with 7:10 left in the fourth.

The team got a fast- break layup from Salazar with 5:24 remaining and shot free throws the rest of the game.

"We didn't attack," said Joey Trujillo, Pojoaque's head coach. "We weren't aggressive like we were in the first half. We started settling for 3-pointers."

The Elks stayed within striking distance thanks to hitting 7 of 8 from the charity stripe in the final 4:22. But it was apparent they were far too timid to penetrate the Horsemen zone.

Friedman said the credit for the success of the zone should go to the two guards playing on top of the zone.

"They made it hard for Pojoaque's guards to penetrate," Friedman said. "We work on defense a lot and I thought we executed it pretty well (Thursday)."

One of those guards, junior Brandon Martinez hit 3 of 4 3-pointers, including two in the first quarter, and scored nine points. St. Michael's senior guard Patrick Griswold had six of his team-high 12 points in the fourth.

The Horsemen won the battle of the boards 26-19.

Both coaches said the 16-game streak is something they don't talk to their teams about.

"There's different kids on every team every year," Trujillo said. "There's no point in talking about what happened in the past."

For Geyer, whose Horsemen have won the 2AAA crown for five straight years, there is a more important streak on the line.

"This was a great win for us," Geyer said, " because it puts us in a position we can still make some noise in district. That's what was important about it."

While Santa Fe Indian School sits in first place in the 2AAA standings,
St. Michael's (3-2), Pojoaque (3-2) and Las Vegas Robertson (2-2) are all thinking they can make a run at the Braves.

"Had we lost tonight," Geyer said, "that would be three losses. Now, we're still alive in the district. ... We can't worry about anyone else or what anyone else thinks about these games. If we want to be in a position to win the district, we just have to focus on each game in front of us."

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