Porterville and the Miners are an even 5-5 against one another since December of 2016, but not for long. The Porterville Panthers will be playing at home against the El Diamante Miners at 7:30 p.m. on Tuesday. Porterville has been getting the ball to fall more lately as they've increased their point totals each of their last three games.
Winning is just a little bit easier when you work as a team to rack up eight more assists than your opponent, a fact Porterville proved on Friday. They walked away with a 50-37 victory over Golden West. Given Porterville's advantage in MaxPreps' California basketball rankings (they are ranked 364th, while the Trailblazers are ranked 844th), the result wasn't entirely unexpected.
Porterville found their leader in underclassman Ryleigh Schoonover, who dropped a double-double on 35 points and 22 rebounds. That makes it nine consecutive games in which Schoonover has scored at least a third of Porterville's points. Sare Ortiz was another key contributor, scoring nine points along with seven assists and five rebounds.
Meanwhile, El Diamante put the finishing touches on their 11th blowout victory of the season on Friday. They took their game at home with ease, bagging a 68-20 victory over Mt. Whitney.
Porterville has been performing well recently as they've won four of their last five games, which provided a nice bump to their 15-9 record this season. As for El Diamante, their win bumped their record up to an identical 15-9.
Porterville was taken down by the Miners 65-35 in their previous matchup back in January. A big factor in that loss was the dominant performance of El Diamante's Olivia Torres, who scored 28 points. Now that Porterville knows the damage she can cause, will they be able to stop her this time? Check MaxPreps.com after the match to find out.
