This dry swath of high-desert terrain, beautifully sculpted with its arroyos, mountains and evergreen forests, is special for more than its cosmetic narrative.
Turns out this geographical way station which, some might say, is unceremoniously squeezed onto the map between the West Coast and the big ol' heart of Texas, is the home to one of this country's best annual amateur sporting events. And at the root of it is the area most of us call home.
Northern New Mexico is the fuel that drives the powerful financial engine that is the New Mexico Activities Association's high school state basketball tournament. Every year this area, which encompasses the rabid fan bases of Pecos, Los Alamos, Mora, Ojo Caliente, Taos, Espa?ola, Pojoaque, Tierra Amarilla, Las Vegas and Santa Fe, to name a few, provides the boost that makes the tournament the unique sporting event that it is.
"You know, I'll travel the country and try to explain our tournament at national meetings, and most of the time people can't believe it," says NMAA executive director Gary Tripp. "It's almost unheard of to have a high school event succeed the way ours has, but to have it in New Mexico, a place that most people would never expect -- it's amazing to see a person's reaction to it."
Often held in Albuquerque and hosted by The University of New Mexico during the same week that the beloved hometown Lobos are playing in their conference tournament, the state tournament has every reason to fail. With the metro area's basketball fanatics distracted by UNM's exploits out of town, common sense would dictate that ticket sales at the tournament would suffer.
Not so. Far from it.
The 2010 tournament was a classic example of what kind of effect the North has on the week-long event. That year the NMAA raked in a net profit of $454,257, according to research done by NMAA associate director Robert Zayas.
Last year's tournament netted $320,857, thanks in large part to some Northern clubs not making sustained playoff runs.
"It's all about matchups," Zayas says. "If we get certain games at certain times, we're going to get big crowds. That year [2010] we had good crowds."
It did seem like a perfect storm, of sorts, in 2010. The girls AAA tournament had Santa Fe Indian School, West Las Vegas and St. Michael's all reaching the semifinals in The Pit, and Pojoaque Valley advancing to the quarterfinals. SFIS beat West in front of a huge crowd estimated by various media outlets of 11,000 to 13,000.
Add to it the dream matchup of Kirtland Central and Shiprock in the AAAA title game and Kirtland's semifinal game against Espa?ola Valley the day before, Navajo Pine reaching the finals of AA, and an all-Albuquerque showdown between Eldorado and Sandia in the big-school division. The girls brackets were a cash-generating machine.
The boys draw that year had Espa?ola Valley's memorable run to the finals (a loss to Roswell), Capital and Los Alamos both in the quarterfinals and a AAA final four that included St. Michael's and SFIS.
Last year's tournament was highlighted by Espa?ola's memorable march to its first boys championship. The Sundevils practically packed the house three straight days, culminating with a win over Roswell Goddard in the finals.
What hurt the bottom line, however, was a dearth of fan-friendly matchups in the smaller classifications. The best girls games in AA featured Pecos against Pe?asco and Navajo Prep against eventual champion Navajo Pine, but those games were both on a Tuesday morning in Rio Rancho.
The boys AA draw had Mesa Vista reaching the semifinals, but early exits by Mora and Pe?asco
hurt potential big crowds down the line. In AAA,
St. Michael's was bounced in the semifinals on the boys side, but SFIS faced Shiprock in the girls title game.
"Obviously we have to budget conservatively," Zayas says. "We can't plan ahead assuming we'll make [2010 money] every year."
Tripp says there was a time when Northern New Mexico's fan base accounted for approximately 60 percent of all ticket sales. Even now, the revenue generated from the state tournament accounts for at least half of the NMAA's annual operating budget.
That money is then filtered down into other state championship events that often struggle to break even or fail to produce a net gain.
The advent of social media in recent years hasn't had an adverse affect on the tournament attendance, either. In fact, it has probably helped.
The NMAA has given broadcast rights to ProViewNetworks.com to stream all playoff games online. Those games can then be archived, giving fans a chance to watch history play itself out over and over again.
One of the most-watched games in the site's history was the 2009 Class AAAA semifinal boys game between Espa?ola Valley and Artesia, a game the Sundevils lost in triple overtime. In the months and years that followed, that game was repeatedly viewed in the site's archives.
A look the list of championship teams over the years doesn't help explain the North's remarkable fan interest. The basketball isn't necessarily any better than it is in other parts of the state, but its community support is often over the top.
"This sounds extreme, maybe, but basketball is life in a lot of ways to people around here," says Mark Cassidy, the head coach of the Mora girls program. "You get into these smaller towns and it gets into winter, basketball is all you've got sometimes. Then you have a year where one of those teams gets hot, you wind up getting everyone whose ever been in that town coming out to watch the games -- especially when it comes to state."
One person with perspective from both sides of the state is St. Michael's boys coach Ron Geyer. He led the Alamogordo boys to the big-school championship game five times between 1991 and 1998, winning it three times, and has since taken the Horsemen to the AAA title game three times.
Over the years he has seen the girls tournament explode in popularity, thanks to the influence of the Native American schools from the northwest part of the state.
"Those teams, in particular, have really fueled the tournament for a long, long time," Geyer says. "Then on the boys side, I believe the mileage factor is certainly something to consider. When I was in Alamogordo we, and places like Hobbs and even a smaller school like Tularosa, we would always bring a significant amount of fans. But it's not like it is around [Northern New Mexico]. You get into these communities up here and it just means an awful lot. Taos, Mora, Pecos. Their proximity to Albuquerque helps, but I think the people around here would travel anywhere to see their kids play."
Santa Fe High head girls coach Elmer Chavez says the mystique of reaching the state tournament is a driving force behind the fans' interest.
"I don't care where you're from, if your team makes it to The Pit and has a chance to play there in March, your fans are going to come with you," he says. "I've seen it around here. There's something about playing in that building that gets everyone excited. And when you're there, oh, you can't really describe it."
Like most people who've been behind the scenes at the tournament, Chavez says the most endearing memory of being there is the run down the 150-foot long Pit ramp and playing a game in fabled University Arena.
From a player's perspective, the moment immediately before tipoff is something that cannot be forgotten. The only thing visible from the top of The Pit ramp is the southeast corner of Bob King Court.
Emanating from that opening is the sound of the crowd, complete with spirit bands, cheerleaders and students with painted faces, some of whom wave towels and hand-crafted banners. The sound of fans numbering in the thousands is impossible to comprehend for a teenager.
"That's something I always wanted to experience," says SFIS girls basketball player Bridget Lee. "I came here to see what it was like, and the first time I saw it ... Wow. I can't even explain. It gets so loud."
And then the moment comes. With nerves boiling over, the team trots down the ramp. Above them is a ceiling so low that a player can run his or her fingertips along the glossy paint. To either side are walls so constricting that it's almost excusable to get a sense of claustrophobia.
"You come out of that tunnel and hear the crowd," says SFIS girls basketball coach Cindy Roybal, "and you feel alive. Those people make you feel more alive than you've ever been."
It's those people, the fans who have driven several hours and spent a day's wages to fund the road trip, who make the tournament what it is. When their teams burst into sight, the roar is more than just simple support for a team. It's for a town, a community whose pride is placed on the line with the bouncing of a big orange ball.
"I've always said that there are pockets in the south that remind me of Northern New Mexico," Tripp says. "But for every pocket, that's the way it is almost everywhere up north. The way people grab onto football in most places down there, especially the closer you get to West Texas, that's what people do with basketball in that end of the state. That support has been sustained for as long as I can remember."
Tripp is a graduate of West Las Vegas and was a junior on the Dons team that lost to Albuquerque Academy in the semifinals in 1978. That same tournament saw the single biggest crowd in state tournament history, as 18,300 tickets were sold for the AAAA championship game between Lenny Roybal's Santa Fe High Demons and Jim Hulsman's Albuquerque High Bulldogs.
"Amazing," Tripp recalls. "We had a historian come through here a few years ago and he did research into the top crowds across the country. At the time he found that it was the largest attendance for a state tournament game in the Western United States. I'm not sure if it still is. It might be because I was there and I've never seen or heard of a crowd getting that big again."
Of course, that record is safe for the time being. At least, the New Mexico version. Since the recent renovation of The Pit, capacity has been reduced to roughly 15,400.
That includes the luxury suites, which the NMAA is renting from UNM and making available to corporate sponsors for the first time this week.
A quick glance of the brackets heading into tournament week shows a handful of possibilities for Northern New Mexico to flex its proverbial fan muscle once again. On the boys side, St. Michael's and Capital have teams that could advance deep into the tournament. Same for the Mora boys and girls and, of course, the two-time defending champion SFIS girls.
"I've seen a lot of these tournaments, and all I can say is it's special," says Espa?ola Valley girls head coach Ron Drake. "I coached back in New Jersey. You can't even compare the two. The games here are good, but it's the people who make it what it is. The support you get from the people around you, that's basketball up north. As a coach or a player, you have to love it."
Source: http://www.santafenewmexican.com/sports/Every-year-around-this-time--Northern-New-Mexico-hoops-fans-des
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Whatever that move is the New Mexico guys just did, it may get broken out in a bar in Louisville next weekend. 
Andy_Staples 
