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It makes a difference at this point of the national high school season when certain teams are going to be playing each other in upcoming state playoffs. And the playoffs are beginning in several of the biggest states.
The regular season in Texas wrapped up last week and first playoff games are starting as early as Thursday of this week. It would be an absolute shocker if any of the top-ranked teams were to lose, but keep in mind that these rankings were done this week before any Thursday games were played.
National No. 1 Lake Creek of Montgomery will be joined in the Class 5A state playoffs in Texas with several other teams in the Extra Elite 80 national national rankings: No. 11 Heritage of Frisco, No. 13 Barbers Hill of Mt. Belvieu and No. 43 Canyon of New Braunfels. Amarillo (with just one loss) is another team to watch in that bracket. The bottom line is that if Lake Creek does go on to win the state title in that division it would be one of the strongest No. 1 teams nationally in several years.
National No. 2 Lake Ridge of Mansfield would not be playing Lake Creek in the Texas playoffs because the Eagles will be in the Class 6A bracket and not 5A. In most years, the 6A generally is considered superior to 5A in Texas, but there are strong teams in both. Lake Creek’s strongest competition in 6A appears to be No. 5 Guyer of Denton (also unbeaten) along with teams such as Katy (27-5), San Benito (30-3) and Pearland (29-3). Katy just played No. 1 Lake Creek in a playoff tuneup and lost 7-1.
The Louisiana state championships already are well underway with national No. 15 St. Amant set to meet West Monroe on Friday in the semifinals of the D1 (Non-Select) bracket. National No. 44 North DeSoto or national No. 47 St. Thomas More will be in different divisions.
The regular season in California’s CIF Southern Section ends Thursday and first-round pairings for all of its divisions will be out on Saturday. The regular season still has one to two weeks to go in the state’s other CIF sections.
Last year marked the first time ever in which all of California’s section champions played on after the section championships in CIF regional playoffs. There’s still no CIF state finals, but teams like Clovis North of Fresno and St. Francis of Mountain View will eventually have to face other section champions if they keep winning. Those two teams could even play each other, but in the CIF system it’s never known for certain if a team like Clovis North would be sent to the NorCal or SoCal regional playoffs.
Clovis North moved to No. 3 in this week’s Extra Elite 80 due to previous No. 3 Pace of Florida losing its first game. In the big picture, though, Pace’s loss to Orange Beach of Alabama at this point of the season doesn’t matter much for playoff positioning and overall season resume. We just dropped the Patriots behind Coral Springs Charter of Florida in this week’s rankings while continuing to leave them in the top 10.
—Â Mark Tennis
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2023 Extra Elite Eighty Rankings
(Previous ranking in parentheses)
(Through reported games of Wednesday, April 26)
(*Indicates forfeit wins, losses not included)
Top 10
1. (1) Lake Creek (Montgomery, Texas) 34-0
2. (2) Lake Ridge (Mansfield, Texas) 32-0
3. (5) Clovis North (Fresno, Calif.) 20-0-1
4. (4) Ballard (Louisville, Ky.) 19-0
5. (6) Guyer (Denton, Texas) 29-0
6. (7) Coral Springs Charter (Coral Springs, Fla.) 20-0-2*
7. (8) Willow Canyon (Surprise, Ariz.) 26-0-1
8. (14) Watkins Memorial (Pataskala, Ohio) 19-0
9. (3) Pace (Pace, Fla.) 21-1
10. (15) Los Alamitos (Los Alamitos, Calif.) 22-3
*** Scroll down to see the rest of the 2023 Extra Elite 80 teams!