Area fans ready for busy tournament week

While the high school basketball playoffs are where the Gold Ball is the one trophy every team longs to bring home, for many older fans the county tournament title is right up there when it comes to the pride that those titles bring to any small community.

Monday the three largest and oldest county tournaments in Southwest Oklahoma will begin and come next Saturday there will be plenty of happy fans and teams but also some that will be just the opposite if they can’t bring home some hardware.

Comanche County will be conducting its tournament this week at the Great Plains Coliseum and while exact records are hard to find, this year’s event is at least 83 years old with the first boys tournament on record coming in 1941 when Lawton High School claimed the title.

Sterling girls and boys swept the Comanche County titles last season, marking the 31st title for the Lady Tigers, easily the most of any county team.

The girls bracket seems to be where coaches believe there could be some good matchups after the first four games are completed on Monday.

Geronimo girls are the top seed with a record of 16-1 and the No. 6 ranking in Class B. The second seed is Walters with a 10-3 record. Chatty girls are seeded third with a 10-8 record and Chattanooga girls are the fourth seed with a 14-3 record and the No. 11 ranking in Class B.

The Caddo County Tournament also begins Monday at Anadarko High School and with records going back to 1954, this will mark at least the 70th edition of that tournament.

Stephens County has the most complete history of its event which will be conducted at Comanche High School beginning Monday. The records on the Stephens County are complete back to 1932 which makes this the 92nd version of that tournament. Comanche girls and Marlow boys were the 2023 champions.

The Comanche and Stephens tournaments will follow a similar format with four girls games on Monday and four boys games on Tuesday. After that, however, Comanche County will have four more girls games on Thursday and four boys games on Friday. Comanche completes its format on Saturday with six games, two consolation title contests, two third-place games and then the two title games at 6:30 p.m. and 8 p.m.

Stephens County will conduct four semifinal games on Thursday and four consolation bracket games on Friday. Stephens also finishes with six games on Saturday with two consolation finals, two third-place games and two title games at 6:30 and 8 p.m. Saturday.

Caddo County, which has 10 teams in each bracket starts with a busy eight-game schedule on Monday that begins at 10 a.m. Tuesday there will be four games that will feature the top four seeds getting a first-round bye. Cyril girls are the top seed and will get a first-round bye along with Lookeba-Sickles, the No. 2 seed on the girls side. The top two seeds on the boys bracket are Fort Cobb-Broxton as the No. 1 seed and Binger-Oney as the No. 2 seed.

For a complete list of the pairings for the three county tournaments involving area teams, check out the scoreboard on Page 3B.