The 16th spot is not to be taken lightly

Pardon me for asking, but why should there be 16 schools in each state basketball tournament bracket, only the New Mexico Activities Association knows, other opinions are split The 16th spot is not to be taken lightly, for it puts you in the post-season, but having just 1-12 brings frustration

By Arnie Leshin

Welcome to the Sweet 16 handouts. To schools invited to the Sunday New Mexico Activities Association state tournament brackets and seeding, it’s time to slice up the cake. It should be a dozen schools in each class, but to the NMAA, the more the merrier.

So its 16 bracketed for each class. And with this, it invites more schools to tune in to see if they made it. You can hear the familiar cry of “Well, we’re No. 16, wonder if we made it.”

If you did, cherish it. Don’t store away your gear when you’re still playing. But the number of invitees is too much, and with all due respect to the NMAA, that’s my opinion. I’m sure others think the same way, but it’s a numbers game that makes more schools happy, and won, lost records are not part of the conversation.

Except for me. Check it out, when you create a 16-school bracket, the last four are thanking the NMAA, but the last four in most cases give these brackets a losing look.

Let’s start with the girls. In 3A, the chosen dozen sport winning records, the final four are 0-4, and rounds out to 43-66. In 4A, there’s nothing you can do when the first 12 do have one school (Albuquerque Hope Christian) with a losing record, and one that gets in at .500.

Then comes the last four. There are two schools with losing records and one at .500

In 5A, that’s the one that Capital High was counting on. The Jaguars are ranked 16th and have their collective fingers crossed. You can’t argue with that. It’s like somewhat crowded, but don’t tell Capital that as it ended the regular season at 14-14 for its best campaign in a decade.

But above it are three schools with losing records, Miyamura, Farmington and Roswell, but they won’t be bounced out of the top 12. The next four shows two schools with losing records and Capital, the even-steven mark. Only Alamogordo (14-12) owns a winning record.

Now it’s on to 6A where not a top-12 school is found with a losing mark. They all came in with flying colors. But whoops, the final four here has one school at .500 (West Las Vegas), and only Albuquerque Atrisco Heritage has a winning record (14-12). Santa Fe High had no shot. It finished at 9-18 and was ranked 19th. But Rio Rancho Cleveland also put together the same record and grabbed the 16th spot.

Now when you check out a 12-school bracket, you come away with nine losing records and two at .500. Now look at the added four. Here you find 26 schools with losing records and nine at .500.

Any problem with this, check with the NMAA. It apparently likes to make for bigger fields, make other schools have a good feeling, and more parties. Meaning, it you are a school whose boys didn’t make the list, you can at least express joy of having the girls making the sweet 16.

And here come the boys. Again we start with 3A. Only Clayton (12-14) has a losing record among the top 12, but when you locate the next four, you can’t do any better than three schools with winning records, with only Laguna-Acoma (19-19) giving it a better look at .500.

In 4A, St. Michael’s should be among the top 12, but it does sport a 12-15 record. Right around its area comes Las Vegas Robertson and West Las Vegas, both with losing records. On the last four list is Santa Fe Indian School all even at 13-13. One other school is under .500 and the other two do have winning records.

In 5A, you go down to Albuquerque Del Norte, which made last year’s state semifinals after entering the tournament with a losing mark. The Knights are back in, this time at 11-15. And at .500 is Lovington (14-14). But the bottom four has only Miyamura (15-13) with a winning record. The other three all come in under .500, with Los Alamos, at 9-18, probably getting the last spot.
In 6A, all is well record-wise when it comes to the top 12, but Santa Fe High looks to get in because of the final four that has it at No. 14 with a 12-16 mark. Now Onate stands at 18-10 among this quartet, but not so for Albuquerque Sandia and Piedra Vista.

The combined totals of 26 losing teams on the 16-school lineup and the nine that are at .500 applies to both the girls and boys. And, yes, the 12 schools that would make up the smaller and more desirable brackets also total the same, nine with losing records and two at .500.

That’s it, my opinion. Nothing negative to say about the NMAA, just my feeling of going from 16 to 12 schools. Some like it, some don’t, but it’s something that changes each year, which means if a school can’t get into the first dozen, it would be cheering just to make it from 13 to 16. And if it gets lowered to a 12-school field, schools would also be out of luck, and a bid to the state tournament.

It’s a win-win, a lose-lose, it’s that time of year that will have the state tourney playing all over the state, with the last stop the UNM Pit.