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Eighty teams. Eighty stories. And 111 hours of high school state
tournament.
It's time.
The basketball will begin bright and early on Tuesday, at the Pit and at
the Santa Ana Star Center. It will kick off a frenzied five days, the five
best of the calendar year.
When it ends around 11 p.m. on Saturday - 111 hours after tipoff, which is
8 a.m. Tuesday - we will have crowned 10 state champions.
As always, so much to watch:
WISHFUL THINKING: This would have been one of those great
seasons to open the tournament up, Indiana style, and have one giant
free-for-all. This is especially true for the boys, where we have fantastic
entries from top (5A) to bottom (1A).
Imagine a 16-team bracket filled with these schools (sorry, don't mean to
slight anyone):
Class 1A's Cliff (25-1), Class 2A's Mesilla Valley (27-1) and Bosque
School (24-4), Class 3A's Hope Christian (27-1), Sandia Prep (19-9) and
Lovington (22-4), 4A's Roswell (24-2) and Española Valley (25-2)
and the best eight from 5A.
Even better: take the five state champions, extend the season a few days,
and have them play it off. Take the 1A champ against 2A for a play-in game,
with the winner to face the 5A champion in the semifinals. The other semi is
4A-3A.
BENCH MARKS: La Cueva boys coach Frank Castillo is
looking for his fifth title with the Bears. This is the 25th anniversary of
Jim Murphy's first state championship with Hope Christian; he's led the
Huskies to eight blue trophies.
A lot of folks (me included) wouldn't mind seeing Eldorado girls coach
Mike Huston win his first title with the Eagles. The burnt (NOT Texas) orange
haven't won it all since 1995 when some guy named Flanagan was the coach.
And lastly, the embattled J.D. Isler is here with the Clovis Wildcats. And
he'll be coaching the Wildcats for 2010-2011 season, too, after reaching a
settlement with Clovis Municipal Schools. Isler was accused of recruiting
players, but eventually won the right to finish this season and negotiated a
settlement to stay on for another 12 months.
According to his attorney, Isler is going to continue to chase claims for
damages against the NMAA, which suspended Isler for a year last December.
CORNERING THE MARKET: For four straight years (1987-90),
Four Corners powers Shiprock and Kirtland Central played one another in the
state championship game. They played in the finals from 1992-95, too. No
girls basketball rivalry carries as much weight as this one, and they are the
top two seeds in 4A this week.
While Kirtland has appeared in 11 title games since 1995, Shiprock hasn't
been in the finals since 1995.
QUITE A PAIR: The only undefeateds in town this week both
can be found in Class 1A girls, with Cliff (28-0) and Magdalena (27-0).
Probably, there should be four. But Hope's boys lost on a 3-point buzzer
beater to La Cueva, and the Eldorado girls were beat by Hobbs. Uh, that would
be the same Hobbs team that Valley just drilled by 41 points in the first
round.
BEWARE THE TROJANS: About once every three or four years,
Mayfield and savvy coach Tommy Morrow arrive in Albuquerque with a superb
team that no one has talked about. And then very quietly, it squeezes into
the later rounds.
This 23-4 group looks like one of those teams. The Trojans might be the
most obscure No. 2 seed we've ever had in the big-school classification. And
in a year with no clearcut favorite, Mayfield is as strong a bet as anyone.
GOLD DIGGERS: The state tournament is always a great
place to watch the best talent. Like Los Alamos' big man, Alex Kirk, for
example.
If you haven't been following preps regularly, here is a short list of
some players worth checking out: Valley's Mike Maya, Eldorado's Kya DeGarmo,
Roswell's Marek Olesinski, Sandia's Ebony Walker, Cibola's Amber Battle.
There are many others.
AT THE TOP: The story I probably am most interested in
seeing play out is that of Española Valley's boys. The Sundevils
endured a brutally difficult schedule to help prepare them for the cauldron
of the state tournament.
They've fallen in heartbreakers the last two years - as a No. 1 seed - in
the state semifinals. Speaking plainly, the town deserves a shot to play in
the season's final game.
MIXED EMOTIONS: This week we say goodbye to Gallup as a
Class 5A program. This, of course, is not breaking any hearts, especially
among the girls coaches in 5A. Next season, the Bengals move down to 4A,
where they can be a migraine to the likes of Kirtland Central.
PEOPLE WATCHING: Many of the biggest crowds are surely
going to come from the girls' tournament - the Española Valley,
Gallup and Valley boys notwithstanding.
Kirtland Central, Shiprock and Gallup, with lengthy runs this week, will
make the accountants at the New Mexico Activities Association offices very
happy campers.
ESPANOLA, ARE YOU LISTENING? One coach, whose anonymity
needs to be preserved, said the following: If Roswell and Espanola Valley
play 10 times, the Coyotes would win nine out the 10.
Burn! If you live in Espanola, that stings.
LOOKING AHEAD: If you've seen my picks elsewhere in the
section today, you can see that I'm not straying far from the favorites.
On Saturday, we have the potential for several all-city finals, including
both 5A games and 3A boys (Hope-Sandia Prep).
The 5A girls should be Eldorado-Sandia. In 5A boys, I'm going with La
Cueva-Valley. Which would be poetic; those two produced some of the best
basketball games of the season.
With that, I say welcome, everyone. And enjoy.
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