UPDATE: A and AA state seeds and brackets

UPDATE: SEEDS AND BRACKETS ANNOUNCED

The Class A and AA seeds and brackets came out about 10 a.m. Sunday morning. We will have a complete preview of each class tomorrow.

Class AA Wednesday March 15 Mariucci Arena

2 p.m. #1 Roseau vs. New Richland-Hartland-Ellendale-Geneva. Unbeaten Roseau gets the #1 as anticipated. NRHEG is unrated, as also anticipated.

4 p.m. #4 New London-Spicer vs. #5 Esko. Did not anticipate Esko getting a seed with 6 losses. Only Rochester Lourdes comes in with more losses in AA.

6 p.m. #2 Sauk Centre vs. Minnehaha Academy. Minnehaha, with 4 losses, does not get a seed. Esko, with 6 losses does.

8 p.m. #3 Watertown-Mayer vs. Rochester Lourdes. Did not anticipate a seed for Lourdes. But, despite their 9 losses, they are a threat.

Class A Thursday March 16 Mariucci Arena

11 a.m. #1 Mountain Iron-Buhl vs. Southwest MN Christian. As expected, MIB at #1, SWC not seeded.

1 p.m. #4 Ada vs. #5 Maranatha. We had anticipated this matchup.

3 p.m. #2 Goodhue vs. GHEC. No surprise here.

5 p.m. #3 Cromwell vs. Red Lake. Again no surprises here.

Our Original Report Follows

15 of 16 A and AA finals were played Friday night, and Mountain Iron-Buhl won in Class 7A as expected on Thursday night, so the 2 fields are set. Following are the 16 tournament entries listed in order of our Northstar Girls Hoops Rankings. There is of course no guarantee that the official seeds will match.

Class AA

1. Roseau, Section 8, 29-0. The #1 section seed and #1 ranked statewide Rams defeated Staples-Motley (23-5, #2 seed and #12 ranked) 68-48 Friday night. For any other team, a 20-point win against such an opponent would draw oohs and aahs but Roseau, for some reason, brings out the skeptic in everybody. Well, except us. Roseau should be the #1 seed and they will win this tournament. Kiley Borowicz is a great basketball player who could start for a lot of D1 mid-majors right now, today, well, except that there would appear to be a total lack of imagination out there. She is unorthodox. All she does is score 35 points and her team wins. No, don’t need that.

2. Sauk Centre, Section 6, 29-1. Sauk brings a 28-game winning streak to state, but the doubters will be out here, too, because of the 52-50 nail-biter vs. Rush City in the section final. Well, again, that’s because of an irrational disrespect for Rush City. OK, yes, they don’t play anybody over there on the Wisconsin border. That just means they didn’t have a chance to prove how good they were. It didn’t mean they weren’t terrific. And, so, Sauk should still get the #2 seed. But there’s a bunch of good teams behind Roseau, so I’m not gonna guarantee a spot in the finals.

5. Watertown-Mayer, Section 5, 26-3. Defeated improved and improving Holy Family 55-44. Should get the #3 seed.

6. New London-Spicer, Section 3, 26-3. Edged a great Tracy-Milroy-Balaton team 62-55. Should be #4.

9. Minnehaha, Section 4, 25-4. If you want to find a team that didn’t face a real threat in the section, this is it. They’ve won 16 straight, and that ain’t bad, including 18-point margins in their last 2 section games. Should be #5. If NLS and Minnehaha do, in fact, end up #4 and #5, then they’ll play a rematch of last year’s 1st round state tournament matchup. I kind of hope not.

11. Esko, Section 7, 24-6. Knocked off Crosby-Ironton pretty easily, 55-39. I still think they’re short of a seed.

19. New Richland-Hartland-Ellendale-Geneva, Section 2, 25-5. Started out 7-5 but, now, with the emergence of 6-3 junior center Betsy Schoenrock, they’ve won 18 straight. We had Norwood Young America rated #3 and why not after a 1-loss regular season including wins over Cretin, New Ulm and PEM. But, frankly, they looked soft down the stretch, and we picked NRHEG to win this game—and of course they did 53-45—as some of you might recall. Maybe they should get the #3 seed that NYA would have gotten, or maybe #7 is about right. I would split the difference and give some consideration to lifting them up to #5. In order to do that, I’d move Minnehaha up to #4 and drop NLS down to #6.

Unranked. Rochester Lourdes, Section 1, 21-9. But, wait, I haven’t decided what to do with Rochester Lourdes. They’ve got 3 more losses than anybody else but you know and I know that they turned into the Golden State Warriors down the stretch. They will be a threat at state. They won’t get a seed but they’re one of the 5 hottest teams right now.

So I’d rework the rankings a bit and seed them like this—1) Roseau, 2) Sauk Centre, 3) Watertown-Mayer, 4) Minnehaha, 5) Rochester Lourdes, 6) NRHEG, 7) NLS, 8) Esko. Imagine 1st round pairings like this—Roseau vs. Esko, Sauk vs. NLS, Watertown vs. NRHEG, and Minnehaha vs. Lourdes. I can’t get Lourdes and NRHEG any higher as seeds, but they can win games like this.

Class A

1. Mountain Iron-Buhl, Section 7, 29-1. Beat underrated Bigfork 71-64 in the section final. Has to the #1.

3. Cromwell, Section 5, 25-4. Won 4 section games by an average of 35 points. Should be #2 though the more perennial powers will argue the point.

4. Goodhue, Section 1, 25-4. Won 4 section games by an average of 31.5 points. Should be #3. Keep in mind Goodhue lost to MIB by 44. Cromwell lost to MIB by 5 and 7. But, yeah, they’ll get #2. I mean, they are the defending state champs.

5. Maranatha, Section 4, 23-7. Won by 8 and 6 in the section. I dunno, are they down a little? Still, I doubt that they’ll drop below #4.

7. Ada-Borup, Section 6, 28-1. Limited Wheaton to 1 state tournament, beating them 50-44 in the final. Transfer Mariah McKeever from Win-E-Mac was probably the difference between 1st and 2nd. Other than Wheaton, didn’t play anybody, but 28-1 is 28-1. And, with their 3 state championships, they’ll get a seed.

8. SW MN Christian, Section 3, 25-3. Imagine going 25-3 and not getting a seed. Good enough to play with anybody, but they’ll be an underdog to start.

10. Red Lake, Section 8, 24-2. Won at Maranatha. Not a seed. But, win, lose or draw, you gotta see Grace White.

15. GHEC/T/ML, Section 2, 26-4. This is a good field. 26-4 and #8.

All things considered, I would seed them like this (but stay tuned for the official pairings)—1) MIB, 2) Goodhue, 3) Cromwell, 4) Ada, 5) Maranatha, 6) SWC, 7) GHEC, 8) Red Lake. Imagine matchups like this—MIB vs. GHEC, Goodhue vs. Red Lake, Cromwell vs. SWC, Ada vs. Maranatha. Ada vs. Maranatha would be a replay of the 2015 state final won by Ada.