A final, fond farewell to the state basketball tournaments
Seven days, 24 Northern teams, three state champions, 47 games in all. It truly was a historic, and hectic, state boys and girls basketball tournament — and one that won’t be soon forgotten. With that said, here is your state tournament version of Notes. It’s not like we did anything else last week (well, there were the UNM men and women, plus New Mexico Highlands University men).
Want to play “six degrees of separation” with Santa Fe High, Capital, St. Michael’s and Santa Fe Indian School by way of one family? Well, here we go.
Leonard Mirabal was an assistant coach on the 1988-89 Santa Fe Indian School boys basketball team that won the Class 2A state title over Hot Springs. His oldest son, Terence Mirabal, played basketball at Capital from 1999-2002 and later was an assistant coach at the school — along with Zack Cole, who ended up coaching at Santa Fe Indian School from 2012-14. One of his assistant coaches on the team was Jason Abeyta, who ended up becoming head coach at SFIS in 2016. His team beat St. Michael’s in the Class 3A semifinals on Friday to advance to the state title game. The Horsemen head coach is David Rodriguez, who once coached at Santa Fe High from 1992-2002 and from 2010-16. His replacement was Cole, who helped lead the Demons to the Class 5A championship game on Saturday in just his third season.
Oh, and Cole’s father-in-law? Capital head coach Ben Gomez, who coached brothers Bryan and Terence Mirabal. Their dad is … You get the picture.
Saturday’s championship glare in The Pit had a special moment that passed so quickly that hardly anyone noticed. Moments after the West Mesa girls basketball team was awarded the blue trophy for winning Class 5A — the first in school history — Lady Mustangs point guard Maria “Cece” Barela jogged over to the south side of the arena near the base of the ramp.
There she met her father, Leroy, who leaned over the railing and gave her a long hug. Both had tears in their eyes, something Cece carried with her into the postgame press conference just a few minutes later.
A sophomore, Cece Barela was an offseason transfer from Las Vegas Robertson who wound up averaging 9.4 points, 6.1 rebounds, 2.3 assists and 2.2 steals for a team that finished 29-3 and beat top-seeded Hobbs in Saturday’s championship game.
Her dad had been Robertson’s head coach until he left last spring. He moved to Albuquerque last May, enrolled Cece at West Mesa and the rest, as they say, is history.
It turns out that it was a happy ending for everyone involved. Robertson completed its 29-2 run to the 3A state title — its first in school history — the previous day with a win over Santa Fe Indian School.
Ron Drake became the state’s winningest girls basketball coach during the 2014-15 season, his first year at Pecos. On Friday, he earned his first state title in New Mexico when Pecos beat Mescalero, 53-47 win. It wasn’t his first trip down The Pit ramp for a state title game. He led Santa Fe High to the 1997 championship game, where it lost to Gallup, 58-39, for the Class 4A championship.
On the other side of the court was Lady Chiefs head coach Elmer Chavez, who also coached at Santa Fe High from 2009-15. He helped lead the Demonettes to the 4A title in 2014, beating Los Lunas 34-29.
Give that man a mulligan. The public address announcer at the Santa Ana Star Center in Rio Rancho drew a chorus of catcalls during Thursday’s Class 2A girls semifinals when Pecos played Peñasco. During pregame introductions he mistakenly referred to Pecos as Peñasco — an easy mistake for those not tied to hoops in Northern New Mexico.
Both teams are known as the Lady Panthers and one of their primary colors, yellow, is shared. So when he said, “Now introducing the visiting team, the Lady Panthers of Peñasco,” and then began reading off the names of the Pecos players, there was a slight moment of confusion that even caused the Pecos cheerleaders to turn around and stare at the man holding the mic.
It was a good weekend to be from Las Vegas Robertson. Not only did the girls basketball team win the town’s first state basketball title, it could boast about being the alma mater of Albuquerque Atrisco Heritage head coach Adrian Ortega (Class of 1989). The Jaguars won their second straight bigschool title with a 61-58 win over Santa Fe High on Saturday.
Pecos senior forward Faith Flores’ hands are all over the accolades the Lady Panthers acquired this year. She was a part of Pecos’ state championship cross country team that won its first state title in November, then led the volleyball squad to its best finish as it reached the 2A semifinals. On Friday, she helped the basketball team win its first state title as both the boys and girls teams brought home blue trophies. The race for The New Mexican’s NorthStars female athlete of the year is a two-person race between her and Las Vegas Robertson’s Alianza Darley, if anyone was wondering.
It has been eight years since the New Mexico Thunderbirds were purchased by the Cleveland Cavaliers and moved to Canton, Ohio. Now known as the Charge, the NBA G League franchise is now just a curious footnote in the history of professional hoops in the Land of Enchantment.
Yet, all this time later, the team still has a useful place in our basketball culture. The Star Center owns the hardwood floor the T-Birds used to play on and it comes out of storage every March to play host to the various state tournament games.
At least three coaches talked about the confusion the NBA 3-point line caused some of the players. The orange stripe is 23-plus feet from the basket while the black high school 3-point line is 19 feet, 9 inches.
In the heat of the moment it wasn’t uncommon to see a handful of players pull up for a 3-point try from well beyond the NBA line. West Las Vegas boys coach Clyde Sanchez said it was a mental hiccup that caused some of his players to pull the trigger from well outside their comfort zone.
Adios, Thunderbirds. May your legacy return to haunt us again next March.