Basketball Game Preview: Coronado Thunderbirds vs. Eastwood Troopers

Coronado is 1-9 against Eastwood since November of 2018 but they'll have a chance to close the gap a little bit on Friday. The Coronado Thunderbirds will head out to challenge the Eastwood Troopers at 6:00 p.m. Coronado is coming into the game hot, having won their last seven games.

Coronado's tournament run continued when they took on El Dorado on Saturday. Coronado walked away with a 43-34 victory over El Dorado. Given the Thunderbirds' advantage in MaxPreps' Texas basketball rankings (they are ranked 149th, while the Aztecs are ranked 629th), the result wasn't entirely unexpected.

Meanwhile, winning is always nice, but doing so behind a season-high score is even better (just ask Eastwood). They blew past Hillcrest 68-48 on Saturday. The win made it back-to-back victories for the Troopers.

Coronado better keep an eye on Devin Falk-Ramirez. He was instrumental in Eastwood's win, going 10 of 15 on his way to 24 points in addition to seven assists and three steals. The dominant performance gave Falk-Ramirez a new career-high in assists. The team also got some help courtesy of Edward Avila, who went 6 for 11 on his way to 17 points.

Eastwood was working as a unit and finished the game with 18 assists. That's the most assists they've managed all season.

Eastwood's win was their fourth straight on the road, which pushed their record up to 16-5. Those victories came thanks to their offensive performance across that stretch, as they averaged 52.0 points per game. As for Coronado, their record is now 15-4.

Coronado was taken down by Eastwood 56-29 in their previous matchup back in January. That matchup was all but decided by halftime, at which point Coronado was down 34-10.