Serving the High Plains
Serving the High Plains
Sorted by date Results 476 - 500 of 1300
It’s time to usher in the Donnie Garcia era for Tucumcari High School football. Garcia, a football coach at Tucumcari Middle School for 12 years and an assistant coach for the high-school football program for four years, was named head coach of the Rattlers gridiron team on Friday. He succeeds Wayne Ferguson, who stepped down from the post in May after 10 seasons with a 26-71 record, including 1-9 last season. Ferguson will remain as athletic director through mid-2023, at which point he said he will retire. In the past few years, Garcia h...
Logan catcher Park Strong was named Class 1A Player of the Year and Logan coach Kyle Griffiths was named Class 1A Coach of the Year during recent All-State Team voting by the New Mexico Baseball Coaches Association. Pitcher Kaeden Stoner also was a first-team selection in Class 1A from the state-champion Longhorns. Infielder Mason Wallin was a second-team selection in Class 1A, and outfielders Aydin Kotara and Diego Sanchez each were honorable mentions. Strong, a junior, led the Longhorns in...
A former Tucumcari High School girls basketball star is returning to eastern New Mexico. Ashley Shipley has transferred from Texas A&M-Commerce to Eastern New Mexico University, reported ENMU women's basketball coach Meghan De los Reyes in a news release Wednesday. "Ashley provides instant energy," De los Reyes said. "She takes pride in doing all of the little things and brings us toughness. Ashley takes charges, sprints hard both ways and is a total gym rat who will do whatever it takes to win...
Andy Guzman of Mesalands Community College finished fourth in bull riding overall Saturday at the College National Finals Rodeo in Casper, Wyoming. Guzman also earned men’s Rookie of the Year honors. Guzman, a freshman who was California’s state champion bull rider in high school, was in third place going into the finals. He scored a 77 1/2 for second place during the first round and an 80 for second place on the second round but failed to complete a ride during the third round. He also failed to stay on his ride for the requisite eight sec...
Recently retired Logan High School track and volleyball coach Robert Young received notice Monday he’s a finalist for the National High School Athletic Coaches Association’s National Coach of the Year as a girls track coach nominee. Young is one of eight finalists for the honor, which are nominated by their respective state associations. The winner will be announced this week at the association’s annual coaches convention awards banquet in Des Moines, Iowa. Young retired last month after 38 years in coaching, including the last 10 at Logan...
A Logan eighth-grader will be one of New Mexico's representatives at a national rodeo competition in Georgia later this month. Rylan Montoya, a student at Logan Municipal Schools, has earned a position on the New Mexico junior-high team and will travel with teammates to Perry, Georgia, on June 19-25 to compete at the National Junior High Finals Rodeo. Montoya will compete in team roping with partner Joe Cortese, a sixth-grader from Fort Sumner. Featuring about 1,200 contestants from 43 states,...
SAN JON — The San Jon Municipal School board voted to add wrestling to its list of sports offerings this fall but balked at adding esports until it learned more about it. The board during its meeting on May 24 had the approval of wrestling and esports in the 2022-2023 school year on its agenda but tabled the latter after several board members, especially Brian Watson, expressed concerns about the effects of the activity on children. Superintendent Janet Gladu several weeks ago quizzed San Jon children about their interest in a variety of s...
Mesalands Community College last week announced commitments from several area athletes for its new cross-country and esports programs that are set to launch this fall. On Friday, a signing ceremony was held in Tucumcari High School’s Snake Pit gymnasium for senior Manny Hernandez, who committed to the Stampede’s cross-country program. Hernandez was a state qualifier for the state cross-country meet in four of five years, including when he was a Rattlers varsity runner as an eighth-grader. Allen Moss will be the Stampede’s cross-country coach...
To hear Wayne Ferguson tell it, he resigned Thursday as Tucumcari High School football's head coach because the opportunity presented itself to do so. Ferguson explained in his office Friday morning his stepping away from football had been "in the works the past few years," but the timing wasn't right. In recent days, Tucumcari history teacher and assistant girls basketball coach Sarah Jackson resigned to take a similar position in Logan. That opened an opportunity for Tucumcari Public Schools...
The first Diamondback Booster Club athletic banquet since 2019 served as the last hurrah for the club's outgoing president and a retiring Hall-of-Fame wrestling coach at Tucumcari High School. More than 300 people crowded into the Tucumcari Convention Center on May 23 so coaches and supporters could honor athletes from the 2021-2022 school year. It was the club's first such banquet in three years because of coronavirus restrictions. Khobie Salvador was named Male Athlete of the Year, and Elena...
Tucumcari High School's wrestling program reached the end of an era when head coach Eddie Encinias submitted his retirement letter last week after 22 seasons and guiding nearly as many state champions during a Hall of Fame career. Encinias, who also resigned as assistant coach in football and track, said he felt increasingly obligated to retire after undergoing surgical replacements of both knees and one hip in the last two years. "It's just time," Encinias said Thursday during an interview in...
The Class 1A champion Logan High School baseball team saw six of its players earn first-team all-district honors this season, the most of any squad in District 3. Making the first team for the 20-3 Longhorns were sophomore pitcher-shortstop Kaeden Stoner, junior catcher-pitcher Park Strong, sophomore second baseman-pitcher Brock Burns, eighth-grade first baseman Mason Wallin, eighth-grade right fielder Aydin Kotara and junior second baseman Colton Liles. Freshman centerfielder Diego Sanchez was...
As a possible signal of a brighter future for its program, Tucumcari High School baseball saw two eighth-graders earn all-district honors this season. Rattlers coach George Montano said centerfielder Nick Romero and second baseman Luis Archuleta made the all-district team in rugged District 4/5, which saw two teams advance to the Class 3A title game. Romero led the Rattlers in runs scored (15), hit the team’s only home run and didn’t commit an error in the outfield. Archuleta was third on the team in batting average (.286) and second in on-...
Quay County youth, ranging in age from 5 to 18, recently spent two weeks competing in their 4-H county contests. The following lists are contest winners by age division. Novices and juniors will go on to district contests in Alamogordo in June, and seniors will advance to state competition in July. Novices are from third through fifth grades, juniors are sixth and seventh grades, and seniors are from eighth through 12th grades. Agronomy Novice: First place, Lilly Nials Junior: First place, Elizabeth Kanapilly, second, Keira Black; third,...
Tucumcari’s softball program notched a milestone Wednesday with its first-ever postseason victory in a come-from-behind 13-12 win over Zuni in the Class 3A play-in game at Cleveland High School in Rio Rancho. The Lady Rattlers (14-12) later that day were eliminated from the tournament with successive losses to top-seeded Robertson and Raton. In the playoff opener, ninth-seeded Tucumcari bolted to an 8-1 lead over eighth-seed Zuni (15-8) after four innings. “I knew we would be well-matched with them, and the girls were ready,” Tucumcari coach...
Rematch, and repeat. Logan's second-seeded baseball team on Saturday faced top-seed Gateway Christian for the second straight year in the Class 1A championship game at Santa Ana Star Field in Albuquerque. Again, the Longhorns came away with the victory - this time, an 11-4 decision where they rallied for six runs in the final inning to leave little doubt of the outcome. Logan third baseman Skyler DeLuca caught a pop fly in foul territory for the final out, prompting several teammates to throw th...
Four players from Tucumcari's Class 3A tournament-qualifying softball team recently earned all-district honors. Junior shortstop Alexus Lafferty, junior first baseman Sierra Valverde, sophomore left fielder Harley McKinney and sophomore pitcher Mireya Estrada were the Lady Rattlers who nabbed first-team honors in District 4/5. District champ Dexter totaled seven first-team players, and runner-up East Mountain had five. Lafferty led the 14-12 Lady Rattlers in batting average (.574), runs scored...
The Robert Young era recently came to an end for the Logan High School's highly successful track and volleyball teams, as he is retiring from teaching and coaching at the end of the school year. Young said he announced his imminent retirement to his track and field athletes about two weeks before the season ended. "I gathered them all together, and they probably thought they were in trouble," he said, chuckling. "I think some of them were surprised. It got pretty emotional." He informed...
The Logan baseball team blasted host Cimarron during a doubleheader last week and in the process wrapped up a regular-season district championship. The Longhorns defeated the Rams 18-5 in the first game and 33-4 in the nightcap, with both games shortened by the mercy rule. Logan improved to 16-3 overall and 7-1 in District 3, two games ahead of runner-up Melrose’s 6-3 mark in district play. Cimarron fell to 1-12, 1-7. In the first game, the Longhorns held a 7-2 lead after three innings when they erupted for 10 runs in the fourth. Logan totaled...
ALBUQUERQUE - Tucumcari athletes nabbed a total of three individual state championships and came within an eyelash taking a fourth during the NMAA Class 3A Track and Field Championships last weekend. Senior Khobie Salvador won the boys discus throw Friday and was leading the boys shot put Saturday until his closest rival made a clutch throw in the championship round to pass him. Sophomore Haisley Huffman won the girls long jump by the closest of margins. And senior Delilah Acosta undoubtedly...
The Logan baseball team earned a No. 2 seed in the Class 1A state tournament and will face district rival and third-seeded Melrose in a semifinal Friday. Meanwhile, Tucumcari’s softball team earned a ninth-seed in the Class 3A tournament and will play eighth-seeded Zuni in a play-in game Wednesday. The Longhorns, 18-3 and the defending Class 1A champion, will play the Buffaloes (10-7) at 3 p.m. Friday at Cleveland High School in Rio Rancho. Logan won two of three games against Melrose this season. The winner of that game will face the winner of...
ALBUQUERQUE - Logan athletes took home a total of four titles during the NMAA Class 1A State Track and Field Championships, and the Longhorn girls and boys squads each finished third in the team standings. Haden Judd captured two individual titles for the Longhorns and earned medals in three other events. Sierra Horne won the girls 400-meter dash, as did the Lady Longhorns' 3,200-meter relay. Horne also earned medals in three other events. Judd won the 200-meter dash (23.37 seconds) and the...
LOGAN - The playoffs-bound Tucumcari softball team finished its regular season last week with a doubleheader sweep of winless Logan. The Lady Rattlers (13-10) won the first game 17-1, then emptied their bench and won the nightcap 21-0. Both games on May 2 were shortened by the mercy rule. Tucumcari next will play in the Class 3A playoffs against Zuni on Wednesday at Cleveland High School in Albuquerque. (See other story in this edition.) Tucumcari's Mireya Estrada pitched both games, going a...
The Logan softball team earned its first victory of 2022 with a resounding 17-6 win last week over Clayton in the season finale. It appeared the Lady Longhorns, who are rebuilding their program after a two-year hiatus, might go winless after losing their first 20 games of the year and falling 15-11 in the first game of their season-ending doubleheader against the Yellowjackets on May 3. Instead, Logan notched a relatively easy win in the nightcap. “The girls were very, very excited with the win,” Logan coach Dustin Robertson said. “I’m proud o...
None of the members of the Tucumcari boys golf team advanced from the district meet last week at the New Mexico Military Institute course in Roswell. Tucumcari score a 521 at the five-team meet. Clovis Christian won the district title with a 331 score. Dylan Owen was the Rattlers’ top golfer with a score of 104, with Kaden Brown close behind with a 105. Marcus Lopez (154) and Taylor Rich (158) rounded out Tucumcari’s scoring. Tucumcari coach Justin Garcia said he team looked “pretty good” at Roswell, but acknowledged his players might have be...