Marty Saiz
Marty Saiz is the designer and developer of this website. Marty is working on several books, plus this website to provide the history of high school basketball in New Mexico. He has been involved in high school basketball since 1974.
Marty Saiz graduated from Cibola High School in 1978. His freshmen football, JV basketball and freshmen baseball coach was the legendary basketball coach, Frank Castillo. He was played varsity basketball and baseball for three years. He was an assistant basketball coach for Coach Castillo from 1980-1984. He would also, assist Coach Castillo in the 1984 North – South All-Star game.
Marty became a State Farm Agent on January 1, 1985. He has sponsored youth athletic from little league, YAFL to local and state high school teams and events for the last 36 years. In 1996 while in agency management, he was instrumental in State Farm Insurance become the first corporate title sponsor for the NMAA. State Farm was the title sponsor for 9 years for football and basketball. In the same year, under the leadership of former UNM/UNLV assistant basketball coach and Agency Field Executive, Dennis Hodges, Marty coordinated for the next 16 years the State Farm High School banquets for the All-Metro in basketball, football, and baseball, plus partner with Henry Tafoya and KDEF-AM for the State Farm Player of the Week.
From 1998 to 2000, Marty was involved in AAU basketball. From 2017-2020 was the President of an AAU club under the names of Southwest Titans, Danny Granger Hurricanes, Danny Granger D1 Ambassador, Barstow Boomers, New Mexico Basketball Club and PB Nation- NM. These teams played in NCAA certified events that gave top players in New Mexico exposure in front of college coaches. Over 160 high school players played in the club that went on to play college basketball. Players like Chad Adams, Jaye Crockett, Xavier Blount, Alfonso Hubbard, Alex Kirk, Tim Jacobs, Kory and Bryce Alford, Cullen Neal, Ryan Jones, Joziah Ramos, and many other top players have played Marty’s teams.
He was on the Albuquerque Youth Basketball Board from 2001-2011. In 2005 became the President with the help of Executive Director, Gene Pino grew the league to over 150 teams.
From 2002 to 2015, assisted Henry Tafoya on KDEF-AM radio on over 1000 high school basketball, football, volleyball, and baseball games. Marty did color commentary and occasionally did play by play including the 2009 5A state championship game between La Cueva High School and Highland High School.
He had been taking photos of high school games since 2000 with NMAA media credentials. In fact, he coordinated photography of all NMAA state tournament events in 2007-2008. He has taken over half a million photos.
Marty’s agency would be the title sponsor for 2003-2005 State High School Volleyball Tournament. He continues to sponsor the Albuquerque High School Volleyball Metro Banquet since 2005. He has been a sponsor since 2000 of the New Mexico Games and 2008 of high school events on Proview Networks.
Marty had been on the New Mexico Sports Hall of Fame Board since 2010. He was the President from 2015-2017. He started the scholarship fund and Charity Golf Classic since 2015.
2003 Honored at the Albuquerque Sports Hall of Fame Promotion of the Year for his involvement in Albuquerque Metro High School Recognition program of high school football and basketball.
Chuck Ferris
Chuck is a long-time historian of New Mexico high school basketball. Chuck has a website that statistical information on schools, coaches and state tournaments. Chuck decided to partner with Marty and transfer all his historical data to this site.
Chuck has accumulated a lot of “stuff” about New Mexico Prep Basketball. Many friends encouraged him to start a website. The school, coaching and state tournament brackets information on this website were all work of Chuck over the last 40 years. Since 1954, Chuck has been collected basketball items such state basketball tournament programs and for the last 40 years writing historic articles in the basketball programs.
Chuck was a member of the Capitan State Championship football teams in 1952 and 1953. He played on the “B” team for basketball. He moved to Tularosa finished his last two years of high school. He was member of the 1954 State Championship football team.
Chuck is what some folks call a “basketball nut.” He grew up in Capitan, New Mexico, and moved to Tularosa for my last two years of high school. Basketball has been a big part of his life since 1943, when the Capitan Tigers won the state tournament. Since “Tiger” games were almost the only thing to do during World War II, his four-year old enthusiasm was quickly established. His first state tournament was in 1948, when it was played in Roswell. He can remember well, watching the Wheatland Harvesters defeat the Albuquerque Bulldogs. He continued to attend state tournaments and keep historical records. State Tournaments became important to him.
According to Chuck, “As a player, I was far from good. In fact, I spent most of my basketball time on the bench!” However, he always loved the game and played whenever he could. In college, he played on intermural teams and later he was on several club or church league teams. Always it was more for fun than success. He even tried to referee, but like Chuck said, “ the truth was that I was a worse ref than a player!”
He is incredibly supportive of the New Mexico Activities Association (NMAA) and for what it stands. He does support the purpose of NMAA "Teaching Morals, Character and the American System of Achievement and Victory with Honor."
Meet Our Team
TEAMMATES – BASKETBALL HISTORY
Jim Hulsman
Jim Hulsman has been a historian of high school basketball in New Mexico for over 50 years. His research is now archived at The University of New Mexico’s Center for Regional Studies Center For Southwest Research – Zimmerman Library.
Jim is the 6th winningest coach in New Mexico boys’ high school history. Jim, a 1947 Albuquerque High School grad, led the Bulldog program for 34 years.
His teams won 660 games and appeared in 24 state tournaments, winning 7 state titles in 14 state championship games. His teams won 13 District titles.
He was named State’s Coach of the Year four times. He was inducted into the Albuquerque Sports Hall of Fame in 1989. National Federation High Schools Hall of Fame in 2003 and National Coach of the Year in 2001. National High School Athletic Coaches National Hall of Fame in 1999 and National Basketball Coach of the Year in 2002.
In 1988 he was selected to coach some of the finest high school players in the nation during the 11th annual McDonalds All-American High School Basketball Game.
Dana Childs
Dana Childs is the main videographer for interviews for the books and this website on the history of New Mexico high school boys basketball.
Dana has been a key member of the ProView Networks broadcast crew, able to direct, run the camera, and play by play.
Dana is from Nebraska, where he was a three-sport star athlete at Lincoln East High School. He was an inside post player for the Lincoln East team that won the 1978 big school basketball championship.
He earned All-City and Second-team All-State honors in basketball. He was an All-City and All-State tight end in football and was one of the leading receivers and punters in the state. In the spring, he was an All-City track selection in three events. At the state meet, he finished fifth in the high hurdles, got a silver medal in the low hurdles plus won the “all classes” gold medal as part of the mile relay team that helped Lincoln East win its second consecutive state championship and the “all class” team award. He was selected as the Lincoln East Male Athlete of the Year in 1978.
He was inducted into the Lincoln East Athletic Hall of Fame in1994.
He played one year of football as a split end on the 1978 Nebraska freshman football team in college. In 1979, he switched to basketball and began a two-year run at Northeast Community College in Norfolk, Nebraska, where he earned his Associate of Arts degree in Broadcasting. He finished his athletic career with one year of basketball 81-82 at Wayne State College in Wayne, Nebraska.
Dana had been a rock radio personality since KFMQ Lincoln in 1982. In Albuquerque, he worked at Rock 108 KFMG before moving to 94 Rock, where he began covering Lobo basketball in 1989 by doing live call-ins from The Pit to the station at halftime and after the game. From 1992-95 Dana became heavily involved in sports broadcasting while working for KRSN/KNLA Los Alamos. He became the station's sports director and created Sports on the Hill, a daily radio report on Los Alamos high School sports that became a weekly TV show on PAC 8 TV. He was the color commentator working with Burt Buehrer, who taught Dana how to do play-by-play for game broadcasts. Dana returned to broadcasting sports in 2016, filing special reports and broadcasting sporting events for ProView Networks in Albuquerque.
Los Alamos also introduced Dana to coaching. Beginning with Jr. High basketball for Coach Terry Hiller from 1992-1995. Dana’s next coaching opportunity came from Willie Owens and Sandia Prep coaching the C team from 2001-2003. Finally, he was lucky to be an assistant coach with Brian Shock from 2005-2006 in Aztec. After coaching, he became an official and for one year called Jr. High, C Team, and JV games all over San Juan county.
Rick Shed
Rick Shed has been a historian of Hobb High School basketball for many years. He has also been chronicling all the big schools in New Mexico and West Texas scores of games since 1953.
Rick Shed has a Facebook page dedicated to the History of Hobbs Basketball called “Hobbs Basketball by the Numbers”. Shed has also published a Stat book on the History of Hobbs Basketball located on Amazon.
Rick Shed was born in Hobbs, New Mexico, and lived in Hobbs till the 6th grade. During this period, Shed played in the Hobbs Basketball program’s fifth and sixth-grade leagues in both the winter and summer leagues and developed an appreciation for the Hobbs program's greatness. According to Shed, “if Hobbs High School basketball program were a 500 club, I would have never been interested in following them.
Tasker was a great Coach and built one of the best basketball programs in the country”. Shed moved away from Hobbs to South of Fort Worth in his sixth-grade year. Shed went to schools in Joshua and Cleburne, Texas. Shed lettered in Basketball and Baseball while in High School. While at Joshua High School, Shed met legendary Coach Charlie Turner of Fort Worth Paschal fame. Turner was familiar with Hobbs and Coach Tasker and started conversations with Shed on High School Basketball. As an athlete, Shed’s senior season was cut short after an accident with a parachute left him with a fractured elbow and turned into Bursitis the remaining year. Not having Baseball to practice, Shed went to Hobbs to visit his father during Spring Break.
For the whole week of Spring Break, Shed went to the Hobbs Public Library and researched the History of Hobbs Basketball. According to Shed, the person who showed him how to use a microfilm machine was none other than Mrs. Margaret Tasker, Coach Tasker’s wife. After graduation Shed began working in construction for the next 20 years. Shed worked on projects in New Mexico, Texas, Louisiana, and Colorado. According to Shed, a transfer to the Houston area ended with him going back to school and getting a teaching degree. Shed has worked for the Hobbs Schools for the last 18 years, teaching History and Coaching Football and Boys and Girls Basketball. Shed has a Master’s degree in History and Education from the University of the Southwest. Shed was a board member of the Lea County Sports Hall of Fame for four years and still contributes to the organization. Shed is married to Catherine Shed and has a son Ralph Shed, who was named after Ralph Tasker.
Shed has created a web page on High School Basketball for New Mexico and West Texas. The website address is www.nmwtxbb.com.
Steve Flores
Steve Flores wrote and published "Ghost Town Basketball" book. The book is about high schools who are closed and no longer compete in high school basketball in New Mexico.
Steve Flores grew up in Santa Rosa, New Mexico. During his youth, Steve was often at Santa Rosa High school sporting events, as his father was a football coach and coached girls’ basketball.
Steve later attended Santa Rosa High School, where he participated in football, basketball, and track. He was a three-year starter in both basketball and football for the Lions.
After high school, Steve played football for Highlands University as a freshman and went on to graduate with a degree in Secondary Education with a minor in History. He began his teaching and coaching career at West Las Vegas . During that time, he coached football, basketball, and track.
In the summer of 1995, Steve married Kristina Garnand and moved to North Carolina. Kristina attended graduate school at Duke University and Steve began teaching and coaching in Durham, NC. During the ten years in North Carolina, Steve attend football and basketball games regularly at Duke, North Carolina, and NC State. In 2001, Kristina received her Ph.D. from Duke University and in 2005, Steve graduated from North Carolina Central University with a Masters' in School Administration.
They decided to move back to New Mexico at that time to get their infant son, Marcus closer to family. He stayed home during 2005-2006 school year to complete the book. Steve would travel the State, where he wrote and published "Ghost Town Basketball" book.
Currently, Steve teaches New Mexico history for Albuquerque Public Schools.
Anthony Griego
Anthony A Griego Jr is the owner XL Sports Photography of New Mexico. Anthony has been taking action photos for the last 20 years. He will be providing photos for the website and photos for purchase.
Anthony started taking photos at a young age, He was my father’s little security guard, watching his camera gear while he was photographing weddings.
Anthony worked for Kim Jew Photography studio for 20 years. He helped create a sports photography department at Kim Jew Photography. When Kim’s brother, Paul decided to branch off and start his own photography study, Anthony oversaw the Moji Sports Photography department. Since 2010, Moji Sports Photography has been the official photography company of the New Mexico Activities Association.
Paul Jew was instrumental in helping Anthony further his career in the sports photography world. In 2017, after 25 years with the Jew family, Anthony opened his own company, XL Sports Photography.
In the last 20 years, Anthony has done photography for the New Mexico Sports Hall of Fame, University of New Mexico Athletics, Albuquerque Isotopes, Albuquerque & Rio Rancho Public Schools, YAFL, AYBL and many little leagues.
Anthony has also been a sponsor of the State Farm High School Recognition banquets for football, basketball, baseball and volleyball. He enjoys creating and providing sports photographic memories.
Kenny Saiz
Kenny Saiz will assist the team with technology and social media.
Kenny is a 2009 Albuquerque Academy graduate. He played varsity football for three years; varsity basketball for two years and was on the varsity track and field team in his senior year.
He played football at Trinity University, a D3 university in San Antonio, Texas.
He is working currently for an engineering firm in Albuquerque.
Tyler Dunkel
Tyler Dunkel is the Assistant Director of Sports for the New Mexico Activities Association. He is the gatekeeper of state record for all high school sports in New Mexico.
Tyler Dunkel is a native of Parker, Colorado but has lived in New Mexico for over 20 years and has been an athletics administrator for nearly 25 year.
He spent his first 14 years in the Land of Enchantment in Las Cruces, N.M., working for the New Mexico State Athletics Department, first as the Assistant Director of Media Relations, then as an Assistant Athletic Director of Media Relations, overseeing all aspect of media relations and communications for the Aggies' athletic department.
In 2014, Dunkel accepted a position with the New Mexico Activities Association in Albuquerque, N.M., as an Assistant Director of Sports. The NMAA is the governing body for High School Sports and Activities for the State of New Mexico. At the NMAA, Dunkel is the golf liaison for the State, while also handling the office social media accounts and website.