The Week Ahead: It’s all about the state tournaments

Nashua North's Jayden Montgomery soars to the hoop during Friday night's regular season finale vs. Winnacunnet at Titans Gym. (Telegraph photo by TOM KING)
The fun begins this week, and the anticipation will be today when, as expected, the NHIAA Divsion I and II boys and girls basketball tournament pairings plus all the boys and girls hockey pairing are released.
Then will come a flurry of time changes, etc., and plus with a winter storm looming Monday night into Tuesday, that could impact the schedule in some way.
Without that, Tuesday will be the night for the Division I girls and Division II boys hoop prelims. The only local playing in girls would be Alvirne and in boys that would put the Souhegan and Milford boys teams in action, the former at home and the latter on the road.
Wednesday is a the busiest night/day. It’s possible all five local Divison I boys hoop teams will be playing – Nashua North, South, and BG at home and Alvirne and Merrimack on the road.
In girls hoop, Hollis Brookline and Milford would also theoretically have home prelim games in Division II.
There won’t be any hockey teams in action until the Bishop Guertin girls take the ice at home in the quarterfinals on Friday. The local boys teams will be skating on Saturday – Bishop Guertin in Divsion I, Merrimack in Division II, Hollis Brookline-Derryfield as well as Pembroke-Campbell in Division III.
Anyway, we’ll find out exactly who, when and where later today.

GREAT POSTSEASON FOR MERRIMACK
It’s been a great postseason so far for Merrimack, that’s for sure.
Merrimack has taken home one team trophy, that coming in bowling, and in the last two weeks, the Tomahawks can claim three individual state champions.
Two weeks ago gymnast Mia LeBlanc was the top All-Around at the State Meet in Salem. Then this past Saturday, Ryan Church captured the NHIAA Individual bowling title, and Emily Angelo won a state title at 132 pounds in the first ever NHIAA Girls Wrestling Championships, a historic event.

SECOND LIONS CLUB AWARD
The Nashua Lions Club handed out its Bishop Guertin Unsung Hero Award for girls basketball last week, and then this past Friday did the same for the Cardinal boys. Winner of the Dick Piwowardki Usung Hero award is BG senior Robert Canaway III. Lions Club officials as well as Piwowarski family members took part in the presentation along with BG boys coach John Fisher.
Awards will be given soon for North and South boys and girls as well.
CONCORD CHRISTIAN WINS DIVISION III GIRLS CROWN
It was only more or less a practice game that went largely unnoticed during the holiday break two months ago, but the contest that week between Bishop Guertin and Concord Christian could end up being a bout hetween two state champions, if the Cards win it all in Division I. That’s because Concord Christian ended Conant’s three-year reign atop Division III with a 49-35 win. The Kingsmen also handed Conant its first regular season loss since 2019 back on Feb. 6.
NORTH-SOUHEGAN BOWS IN FINALE
It was a tough weekend for the Saber-Titans, as they were outscored 15-1 in their final two games. They fell to Windham on Sunday in a makeup game, 7-0, at the Salem Icenter.
North-Souhegan, which needed to win both games this past weekend to have a shot at the Division I state tourney, finished the season at 6-12.