Eagles repeat as tournament champions

PETER STEIN
NEWS-SUN
New Year’s Eve is a day for looking back and looking forward.

Fitting for the Hobbs boys basketball team, because the Eagles gave themselves good news for both 2025 and ’26.
With Wednesday’s 41-36 comeback victory over Albuquerque High in the 66th Hobbs Holiday Tournament title game, the Eagles brought the good news for ’25 by repeating as tournament champions.

And what that seems to say about Hobbs is the good news for ’26. The Eagles were down for most of the game at Ralph Tasker Arena, but made the baskets and defensive plays at just the right times against one of the state’s best 5A programs.

This is a Hobbs team that wants to own more than a Holiday Tournament trophy this season; the Eagles would like to accessorize it with a blue trophy inside the Pit in Albuquerque, just over 70 days from now. So beating a powerhouse like Albuquerque High could be a good sign for more exciting days to come.

But first, there was time to savor the excitement from the last day of 2025.

“It’s really incredible,” said Ronald Ross, the first former Hobbs player to go on to win two tournament championships as Eagles head coach. “I’m really lucky to have won two in a row with two great groups of young men. For me it’s always a privilege. We know how important it is to win the Holiday Tournament at home, how special it is, and what it means to the crowd. So to be able to do it twice is very special.”

“It means a lot,” Hobbs junior Malakhi David said. “Last year we won it, but I was injured for it, so this is great to share the experience on the court.”

“It means everything,” Eagles senior Josiah Clay said. “This is my last year, I wanted to just leave it all on the court and have something to remember, especially with my family here.”

“We won it last year, like Mal said, so we went back-to-back,” Hobbs junior Lyric Soria said. “And we pushed through adversity, down at halftime, so keeping the guys together and relying on each other meant a lot.”

The Eagles trailed 8-1 in the first quarter, 19-10 by that quarter’s end, 25-23 at halftime, and 31-30 at the end of the third.

They didn’t take their first lead of the game until a minute into the fourth quarter when a short turnaround bucket from

David put them up 32-31. Even that edge was short-lived because Albuquerque High then scored five straight points to build a 36-32 advantage.

David stuck a left-corner three with 2:50 to go in the fourth quarter, drawing the Eagles within a point. They had a couple of possessions with chances to go ahead, but turned the ball over both times. Finally with not much more than a minute to play in the fourth, Hobbs had possession again and capitalized this time. The ball came to David just beyond the right arc, and after a sly head fake, he calmly sank a trey that gave Hobbs a 38-36 lead.

“I just felt in my rhythm,” David said. “I just felt like I was flowing, so I just took it.”

Albuquerque called timeout with 48.6 seconds left, and talked it over while the Taskervitch band let fly with a little brass ‘Rock Lobster’ action. But when the Bulldogs came out of their timeout, they handed the ball over, as Soria came up with a steal.

“It was really Braddock,” Soria said of his teammate Braddock Beaty. “He made the guy cough it up; I was just in the right place to get the steal.”

Albuquerque High had to resort to intentional fouling, and needed three of them to knock Hobbs into the bonus. But on the third foul attempt, the Eagles accidentally turned the ball over, giving the Bulldogs another chance to regain the lead.

On the other end, Albuquerque’s Brenden Rico was headed for the hoop, when Clay did what Knicks announcer Walt Frazier would call ‘rising and surprising’ as he leapt up and blocked Rico’s shot.

“I knew I had him, I knew I had that,” Clay said. “I wanted him to do that, actually, I wanted him to take that shot.”
Hobbs regained possession as a result of Clay’s block, and Clay was at the foul line with 12.1 seconds remaining in the fourth. His first attempt missed, but the second fell and bumped the Eagles’ lead to 39-36.

That meant it was still a one-possession game. On the other end, Rico went for the tie, attempting a left-arc three, but it was off, and David was there to collect the big defensive board.

David went to the line with just 1.1 seconds left, and he knocked down both attempts to essentially end the game by giving Hobbs a 41-36 advantage.

Albuquerque’s ensuing inbound pass was deflected by Hobbs’ Javen Hernandez, and the buzzer soon sounded. The Eagles were Holiday Tournament champions for the second year in a row. Notably, they had held Albuquerque to just 17 points in the last three quarters combined after allowing 19 in the first.

“Our boys are resilient,” Ross said. “They’re tough, they understand what it takes to win, and they understand what they need to do to prevent us from losing.”

The Eagles improved to 11-1 as they looked ahead to the rest of their season. Beating Albuquerque will help them face that stretch.

“I think it will make our team a lot stronger,” Clay said. “I feel like we’ll have more confidence going further into the season.”

“That’s one of the best teams in the state in my opinion, and we just beat them,” Soria said. “It just shows we can compete with the north teams.”

“Based on our team morale, chemistry, whatever you want to call it, our spirits are pretty high,” David said. “But we know our job’s not finished, we’ve still got a long season left ahead.”

Albuquerque 19   6  6   5   – 36
Hobbs    10  13  7  11  – 41