Shiprock girls receive No. 11 seed after NMAA reworks 4A bracket

Posted by Quentin Jodie | Mar 5, 2026 | Basketball |

By Quentin Jodie
Navajo Times

WINDOW ROCK – The Shiprock girls basketball team are playoff bound.

The Lady Chieftains (15-13) finished third in District 1-4A behind top-ranked Kirtland Central and No. 2 Gallup with a 6-4 record in league play.

Shiprock reached the semifinals in the district tournament last week, losing to Gallup. Despite coming up short, the Chieftains receive an at-large bid to compete in the 16-team Class 4A bracket.

During Sunday’s selection show, Shiprock was awarded the No. 13 seed, and with that they were suppose to match up with fourth-seeded Hope Christian in the first round.

Afterward, Shiprock coach Robert McCaskell knew there was a discrepancy with where they were seeded.

“We should have been higher,” McCaskell said of his initial feeling. “You know, we were ranked 10th in MaxPreps in 4A and we had a lot of criteria points over the teams that were seeded ahead of us in the initial bracket.”

On Wednesday, the New Mexico Activities Association released a statement regarding an error in the way they seeded the 4A bracket.

“We regret to announce an error was discovered in the seeding and selection process of the Girls Class 4A Bracket for the 2026 Nusenda Credit Union State Basketball Championships,” the NMAA stated. “The comparison process between St. Pius X High School, Espanola Valley High School, and Shiprock High School resulted in the misplacement of teams seeded 11-15.

“Upon a thorough review, the NMAA has corrected the bracket and the new 11-15 seeds are as follows: Shiprock (11), St. Pius X (12), Grants (13), Espanola Valley (14), and Pojoaque Valley (15). The new bracket is now available and all teams in the Girls Class 4A State Basketball Championships have been notified.”

McCaskell did reach out to the NMAA earlier this week about how they assembled the 4A bracket and he was happy that they corrected it.

The Chieftains (15-13) will now play No. 6 Bernalillo (23-5) on Friday night at 6 p.m.

“We played them earlier in the year,” McCaskell said. “Bernalillo is a big team. All the 4A teams are big teams. When we played them, we played them well, but we just could not stop them inside because we didn’t have the size.”

In that regular season matchup on Jan. 17, Shiprock led 25-23 at the break but they were held to 12 points in the second half with Bernalillo winning 53-37.

“We feel really comfortable playing Bernalillo now,” McCaskell said. “We just have to clean some of those mistakes we had in the paint to give us a chance.”

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