Sports on hold for the next two weeks

Basketball needs games to be eligible for state

Eldorado High School going to remote learning for two weeks is going to leave the Eagles boys and girls basketball teams — the boys more than the girls — precious little time coming out of the shutdown to become state tournament eligible.

Eldorado, in the wake of a handful of positive COVID-19 cases in the student body, has had to suspend all athletics — including practices and competitions — for the same two weeks. Students can not return to campus en masse, and games can’t resume, until April 28.

The boys basketball team has only played three games, the girls four. Both are going to have to play over 50 percent (so, a minimum of six) of their 10 District 2-5A contests in order to be state tournament eligible.

Which means Eldorado’s boys have to find a way to play three games between Wednesday, April 28, and Saturday, May 1. Two already are on the schedule, and the Eagles will need another on top of those two, Eldorado athletic director Roy Sanchez said.

“We’re gonna do everything we can” to make it work for Eldorado, said Albuquerque Public Schools district athletic director Kenny Barreras, whose office handles the basketball scheduling.

“Basketball will be tough. It’s such a tight window,” said Sanchez, who also is the Eagles’ longtime boys head coach.

The Eldorado girls only have one game scheduled between April 28 and May 1, so they only have to add one more game in order to have a chance to participate at state.

The news Monday that Eldorado would send its students back to remote learning, and thus interrupt the basketball season, was difficult to digest.

“It was tough,” Eldorado girls senior guard Cece Barela said of the news of the shutdown of Eldorado’s campus. “The chemistry was starting to build, more than it already had been.”

Said Sanchez, “We didn’t do anything wrong; none of my guys tested positive. … We talk a lot about mental toughness, and now they’re challenged.”

The spring sports at Eldorado will also be impacted, but to a lesser degree as the seasons don’t even begin until next week.

MORE COVID: Eldorado is the latest APS high school to encounter schedule disruptions because of the pandemic.

West Mesa’s boys basketball team had to delay the start of their season, which included a pair of games, because of a positive test inside their program. The Albuquerque High girls had a game against Santa Fe last weekend called off because of a positive test within the Demonettes program. And the Sandia boys traveled all the way to Farmington to play Piedra Vista last Saturday, but a Panthers’ COVID issue forced the Matadors to basically turn the bus around and come right back home without playing the game, Sandia coach Danny Brown said.

“We went to Farmington to eat pizza,” Brown said with a chuckle.