High school basketball's March Madness set to tip: Here's a breakdown of the brackets.

james yodice, albuquerque journal, n.m.

Sun, Feb 26, 2023, 11:59 PM·6 min read

Feb. 26—It's not March yet, but we've arrived at the Madness.

The 160 participants in New Mexico's high school basketball playoffs were revealed on Sunday, setting the stage for the state's premier sporting event — best event period — which will unfold over the next two weeks.

The first round will be Friday (girls) and Saturday (boys), with Week 2 beginning the following Tuesday, March 7.

Boys

Magdalena is the state's only undefeated team remaining in any class, boys or girls, and the Steers were an obvious choice for No. 1 in Class 1A.

The only reason Volcano Vista is not also unbeaten is that second-half comeback by Cleveland a few weeks ago, when the Hawks blew a 22-point lead against the Storm.

Otherwise, Volcano (25-1), the No. 1 seed for the Class 5A playoffs, had a tremendous regular season. The Hawks will open against No. 16 Capital, a team that had a couple of nice victories — including one over No. 3 seed Los Lunas — down the stretch in the regular season.

District 1 was, naturally, given much love (four of the top nine seeds), which stands to reason. Also, that league has produced the state champion in six of the last seven seasons.

Cleveland, Rio Rancho and Atrisco Heritage were seeded 7-9; the Jaguars are at the Rams on Saturday in the first round. The Storm plays host to No. 10 Eldorado.

Los Lunas is home to Las Cruces, the 14 seed.

Sandia, the No, 2, will play Rio Grande — making its first playoff appearance in seven years — on Saturday. West Mesa, at No. 4, is home to Santa Fe.

The only metro-area school with a legitimate road trip in the first round is 11th-seeded La Cueva, which visits No. 6 Carlsbad.

The top three seeds in 4A are from Albuquerque: Academy, Highland and St. Pius.

The defending state champion Hornets lost six of their seven games to strong 5A teams; the only loss Highland had to a 4A opponent was a 53-52 loss to St. Pius. The high-powered Chargers (23-3) only lost one game to a 4A team: Highland.

Del Norte has played in the last two state finals in 4A; Del Norte is the 9, facing a roadie Saturday at Deming.

Valley and Valencia also are hitting the road in the first round, but Hope Christian — a team flying under the radar — is at No. 6.

The northern half of the state showed well in the 3A bracket, with St. Michael's, Navajo Prep and Robertson seeded 1-2-3, and Sandia Prep at No. 4. The Sundevils are home to Newcomb.

Bosque School at No. 6 is also at home, as the Bobcats face Ruidoso.

Pecos is the top seed in 2A; Menaul, the defending state champion, is at No. 4 and the Panthers play host to Lordsburg on Saturday.

Coach Marty Zeller's Legacy Academy is a No. 9 seed in Class 1A; the Silverbacks are on the road at Logan. Evangel/Oak Grove is also on the road in 1A, at Cliff. Magdalena is seeking a third consecutive blue trophy.

Girls

You have to hand it to Hobbs coach Joe Carpenter.

The Eagles lost star guard Wisdom Anthony early in the season to injury, and this young Hobbs team — which was the champion of the Albuquerque metro tournament — barely skipped a beat en route to the No. 1 seed in the 5A bracket.

Volcano Vista, the two-time defending 5A state champ, is seeded third, and if form holds, the Hawks could run into No. 2 Farmington in the semifinals. Those teams split a pair of games in the regular season.

Bella Hines, the state's leading scorer, and the Eldorado Eagles are at Volcano Vista in the first round.

Albuquerque High hoped a 25-win season would earn the Bulldogs a home game in the first round. It did not. But the news was not all bad. The Bulldogs, seeded No. 9, only have to travel a few miles as they'll play No. 8 Sandia on Friday. And the Matadors were one of the two teams to beat AHS — which has a 5A-best 25-2 record — in the regular season.

Kirtland Central, the defending champ, and Gallup were 1-2 in Class 4A, with St. Pius seeded third. The Sartans open with No. 14 Portales. Hope Christian is right behind St. Pius at No. 4.

The inclusion of Albuquerque Academyis a terrific story. The Chargers played their way into the 4A field as an automatic qualifier by upsetting Hope in the District 6-4A tournament final on Saturday.

In fact, both Academy and Deming were surprise district tournament champs, and those two victories combined to knock Goddard out.

For as much as I rail against the uselessness of district tournaments, here we had two examples of how it can move the needle in the other direction.

Academy, the 15 seed, is at Gallup in the first round. Highland, Valencia, Valley and Moriarty are metro-area teams on the road Friday.

Reigning state champ Robertson (26-1 with a lone defeat to 5A's Centennial) has the top seed in 3A, followed by Navajo Prep, which only lost to Hobbs, Farmington and Kirtland Central. That means both of the top two seeds are undefeated against 3A competition.

So far.

The metro area will have Menaul in the 2A field, and the co-op of Evangel Christian and Oak Grove Classical Academy in 1A. Escalante (2A) and Melrose — 1A's powerhouse program and looking for a seventh straight appearance in the state final; the Buffaloes have been runners-up in five of the last six seasons — are No. 1 seeds.

Brackets

A look at the New Mexico's high school basketball playoffs brackets, as presented on the New Mexico Activities Association Twitter account.

Here's a look at the Class 5A Boys Bracket for the 2023 Nusenda Credit Union State Basketball Championships @nusendacu @nmgasco pic.twitter.com/xF7CfUUiai