Buena survived a scare Monday night to improve to 10-0 on the year. Rincon/University (3-9) led 18-13 after the first quarter and only trailed 49-47 with 3:38 left in the game but the Colts pulled together down the stretch to avoid the upset, winning 62-53.

“We are way better than we were last year,” said sophomore guard Kino Bellinger. “I think it all started over the summer when we started to work together rather than as individuals.”

Bellinger leads the team with almost 14 points a game and he is part of a young core of sophomores and juniors with senior David Featherstone in the mix.   The group is still a couple of games behind the 2011-12 squad that started out 12-0, but 10 wins in a row to open up the season has caused other teams to take notice.

A few of the wins have come against some of the top teams in Southern Arizona including Rio Rico, Walden Grove, Catalina Foothills and Cholla. It’s a difficult schedule that has become all too familiar to the Rangers.

“We’ve been playing some really good teams but we’ve been getting better. It’s just not showing up in the win column,” Rincon head coach Rich Utter said on the difficult start.

Utter lost 6-foot-10 standout Brendan Rumel (Portland State) and standout guard Thomas Wabaunsee (Tohono O’odham College) to graduation. The duo combined for 40 points a game last year but the scoring has been spread out more evenly this year with five to six players carrying an equal load. Senior guard Jon Mueller is leading the team at 12 points a pop.

Mueller was limited to five points and Bellinger was held to nine but the slack was picked up by several teammates. Rincon senior Estevan Sandoval scored a game-high 18 points including a 3-pointer to open up the game.

The Rangers led most of the first half but Buena was able to overcome several deficits to stay with striking distance. An 8-2 lead for Rincon was erased by a 7-0 run; a 14-9 lead was removed; an 18-13 lead went away thanks to a 9-4 run and a 28-22 lead gave way to an 8-2 run to tie the game at 30-30 at the half.

The Rangers would show spurts of great play but Buena met them at every turn.

“We play better when we have movement,” Utter added. “We don’t have the big one-on-one players so we rely on ball movement and that’s when we are at our best. But I love our effort.”

Utter seemed to pick up on what it might take to defeat the Colts this year - a team of big athletes with great ball movement that can sustain four quarters of action just might be the key. Buena head coach Dave Glasgow has already met that challenge with wins over athletic teams with size like Catalina Foothills.

Salpointe (8-2) will make a visit to Sierra Vista in early January. If the team doesn’t look ahead, that game could be a battle but Glasgow appears to have his team grounded in the here and now.

“We haven’t talked about our win-streak,” Bellinger said. “We are taking each game as it comes.”

Buena slowly pulled away from Rincon to take a 49-39 lead to start the fourth quarter but the Rangers started to click again and went on an 8-0 run to close to with 49-47 with 3:38 left in the game.

The Colts closed out the game on a 13-6 run to end the threat and came away with a 62-53 win.

Things don’t get an easier for the Rangers with a visit to Catalina Foothills (6-3) scheduled for Friday and Buena will host Douglas (0-8) on the same night.