Farmington girls beat Volcano Vista for regular season district crown in tiebreaker

Posted by Quentin Jodie | Feb 25, 2025 | Basketball |

GALLUP – The regular season district title in 1-5A girls basketball was settled on Monday night with the Farmington Lady Scorpions defeating Volcano Vista by a 48-39 count.

The two squads finished the district season with identical 8-2 records, but Farmington (21-6) had beaten the Lady Hawks (16-10) two times this season.

Despite sweeping the series, the Lady Scorps had to play Volcano Vista for a third time to determine the No. 1 seed for this week’s district tournament.

“I don’t like the new rules,” Farmington coach Tom Adair said of the procedure to determine the league’s top seed as Monday’s tie-breaker was played on a neutral site at Gallup High School.

Navajo Times | Quentin Jodie
Farmington Lady Scorpion Chenoa Parrish (back) applies pressure on Volcano Vista guard Micaela Herrera near the baseline on Monday night at Gallup High School. The Scorps picked up a 48-39 win to claim the regular season league crown in District 1-5A.

Despite his objection, the Scorps never trailed in this game as Farmington kept the Hawks at bay as neither team could establish a good rhythm.

“It was an ugly game, but we got the win,” Adair said. “It’s hard to beat a good team three times and they’re well-coached. Coach (Lisa) Villareal does a great job. She’s coached her team to four out of the last five state title games.”

In other District 1-5A action Monday night, No. 3 seed Rio Rancho defeated No. 6 Cibola 69-34 while No. 5 Piedra Vista scored a 64-56 win at No. 5 Cleveland.

Rio Rancho will host PV tonight at 6 p.m. with the winner taking on No. 2 Volcano Vista on Wednesday night. The survivor of that semifinal game will travel to Farmington on Friday for the championship game.

In Monday’s tiebreaker, Volcano Vista matched the Scorps point-for-point in the early going as a pair of free throws from junior Jalysa Hines tied the contest at 4-all.

Nonetheless, back-to-back 3s from juniors Kjani Anitielu and Caris Dale pushed Farmington ahead for good as the Scorps opened up a 12-4 advantage following a field goal from Harmony Thomas with 3:06 left in the first stanza.

Late in the quarter, Dale added another 3-pointer for a 16-9 cushion, but Volcano Vista cut that margin down to four heading into second with junior Mia Zuniga nailing a trey with six seconds left.

The Hawks got as close as 22-19 following a transition layup from sophomore guard Haylo Whiteman with 1:44 left, but the Scorps used a late 5-0 run to go up 27-19 at the break following a 3-pointer from junior Arianna Charley.

Thanks to some offensive boards, Volcano Vista got within 33-29 after junior guards Adriana Zavala and Micaela Herrera split a pair at the free throw line late in the third.

Farmington, however, got a timely 3-pointer junior Chenoa Parrish to go up 36-29 heading into the fourth.

With the lead, the Adair-coached team passed up some open shots as they killed some time off the clock to secure its nine-point win in the final minutes of the fourth.

Farmington was led by Dale as she finished with 10 points, which included a pair of 3-pointers. Anitielu helped out with nine while junior post Carly Conley and Harmony Thomas added eight each.

The Scorps also received seven from Parrish.

“We didn’t play our best, but we did enough to get the win,” Parrish said. “We had to come together and just play our game, and not their game.”

For Volcano Vista, Hines and Mia Zuniga paced the Hawks with 10 points each while Zoey Loretto added nine.