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Natalia Chavez, center, is mobbed by her Volcano Vista teammates after hitting a shot from beyond 45 feet at the OT buzzer to beat Hobbs for the 5A girls basketball title. (Jim Thompson/Albuquerque Journal)
Saturday, April 10, as much as any day, defined the staggering weirdness of the spring 2021 prep sports semester in New Mexico.
On the same day, the state was staging fall sports in the form of state soccer finals, winter sports in the form of basketball, and the start of spring sports. That kind of confluence had never before occurred.
Or, maybe it was April 1 that underlined this point with more clarity, with prep football played inside University Stadium, part of a five-games-in-three days “bowl game” experiment by the New Mexico Activities Association in lieu of an actual football postseason.
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Darien O’Donnell, left, and Eldorado teammate Trey Robison celebrate their 1-2 finish in the 50-yard freestyle at the boys’ state meet. O’Donnell won in 20.85 seconds. (Jim Thompson/Journal)
The final day of the 2021 spring high school swimming season belonged a little bit to double champions like Darien O’Donnell, Jamin Harlan and Orion Henderson. It belonged also to the Los Alamos Hilltoppers, this year’s big-school state champion. And it belonged, for the final time, to Hall of Fame coach Dave Barney.
The boys state swimming and diving championships on Saturday at the Albuquerque Academy Natatorium saw Los Alamos claim the blue trophy, scoring 397 points in the rare, one-day meet. There were no prelims this season, only finals.