Syracuse, N.Y. — Utica Notre Dame tipped off the 2025-26 Section III girls basketball season with a dominant win over Liverpool on Black Friday, and in the days since, teams across the area have been getting their season openers in.
Here’s the outlook for each Class AAA, AA and A team for the upcoming season, along with some games to look forward to across the season.
Teams in Class AAA
Baldwinsville (last season: 14-8), Bishop Ludden-Grimes (Ludden 14-8, Grimes 22-4), Cicero-North Syracuse (17-5), Liverpool (21-4), Rome Free Academy (15-6), Utica Proctor (4-9)
2025 Section III championship and playoff finish: Liverpool def. Cicero-North Syracuse 51-45, lost to Albertus Magnus 67-47 in state championship
Baldwinsville: “I think that we have a good amount coming back and I think we’re gonna be pretty strong and looking forward to watching them play.” — Kathy Morse
Bishop Ludden-Grimes: “So my overall expectations for us this year, now that we’re a merged school, is to literally have fun and try to figure who we are. I think we have similar kids at both schools, similar energy levels, and some of them play together, so we are already kind of bonded. So I don’t think we are gonna be two separate schools trying to figure it out. I think right now the kids are getting used to each other at school. And the best part about us is that a lot of the kids went to feeder schools together growing up, so it’s almost kind of like bringing them back together, which is kind of cool. So I think it’s just getting the chemistry and trying to figure out who’s going to step up when, because I think this year we’ll be deeper than we’ve ever been. So that’ll be nice. It’ll take a lot of the pressure off of players like Ava Carpenter and Olivia Bitz and Riley Abernethy. And then we also have some younger kids coming up, which will be nice and exciting.” — Carm Petrera
Cicero-North Syracuse: “It’ll be different. We graduated some seniors last year, so we got new kids stepping into new roles, trying to figure out how we’re going to put that all together. So it’ll be fun.” — Rob Siechen
Cicero-North Syracuse’s Rob Siechen (right) and Liverpool’s Mike Wheeler (right) have met eight times in the past three seasons.
Liverpool: “Obviously, coming off going back-to-back-to-back with three sectional titles, hoping to get that fourth. Just getting that fourth sectional title.” — Angeliena Kohler
Rome Free Academy: “For the team this year, I expect us to have a good record. I expect us to go far in the sectionals if we don’t win, and I expect us to have a pretty fast and guard-heavy team this year. We’re mostly young.” — Isabella Cunningham
Utica Proctor: “I think that we’re just trying to build a foundation for them. It’s got to start with the modified. One of my buddies is a coach for modified. I got an awesome JV coach; she moved up from modified. And my assistant is actually the physical education teacher at the school where I teach out at Utica. So I think it’s just you’ve got to first get the coaches, we’re all on the same page, and then build the kids from modified straight up. So a lot of camps, a lot of open gyms, a lot of time together, I think is what we’re going to need to get this program where it should be.” — Christopher Edick
Games to watch:
Liverpool @ Cicero-North Syracuse, 6:30 p.m. Dec. 6: Liverpool and C-NS have faced each other in four straight sectional championship games, though the Legends have taken the last three. Both teams won the home end of their home-and-home series last year.
Cicero-North Syracuse @ Baldwinsville, 6:30 p.m. Feb. 10: The Northstars topped the Bees in all three meetings last season — including knocking them out of the sectional playoffs — but Baldwinsville returned two of its three leading scorers and added two stars from Bishop Grimes in Aaliyah Zachery and Sicily Shaffer.
Teams in Class AA
Auburn (last season: 3-17), Carthage (9-11), Central Square (15-6), East Syracuse Minoa (10-12), Fayetteville-Manlius (5-16), Fulton (10-9), Henninger (7-13), Nottingham (17-7), Oswego (9-11), Syracuse West (5-13), Watertown (0-20), West Genesee (9-14), Whitesboro (2-16)
2025 Section III championship and state playoff finish: Nottingham def. West Genesee 48-42, lost to Catholic Central 66-37 in the regional round
Auburn: “We’re looking to be competitive. We’re looking to improve both offensively and defensively. We had a little down year last year and we have been playing really well and having a good offseason. But last year was a little down year and we’re looking to definitely make an improvement on that.” — Al Giannone
Carthage: “Things are looking really good. We have a great core coming back. Played a lot of basketball this summer. Hard working girls, intense, looking forward to it.” — Amy Dicob
Central Square: “We got some nice pieces coming back. We lost two really good kids. Our point guard, Payton St. Clair, last year was as good as anybody, and we lost a really good shooter in Olivia Chairmonte. But we got three starters back. We got a couple of kids coming up off the JVs, a couple of other returning players, so I like our team. We could use a little more size, but we’re gonna try to rely on our quickness and our shooting and hopefully get the game going up and down.” — Jay Adams
East Syracuse Minoa: “We are kind of in a rebuilding year. We lost seven, five starters and our top six players. So we’re in a rebuilding year, but we’re going to play hard every single game.” — Bob Herrington
Fayetteville-Manlius: “Our outlook’s pretty good. We hold ourselves to a high standard. We were very young last year. We’re looking to build on that. Basically got the same team coming back from last year because we had no seniors. So we’re just looking to jump up to that next level for this season.” — Anthony Bielak
Fulton: “So this is our third year that I’ve been there. We’re looking to win the league this year. We’ve competed. We finished second in the first year. It was a tough year last year. We finished in the middle of the pack, but we got a bunch of players back. We have all-state and all-league players coming back. I think this is our year to shock the world, maybe take sectionals, too.” — Craig Trude
Nottingham: “My overall outlook is just basically to finish where we started off last year. Coming out, just being competitive and just playing Nottingham basketball.” — Cintina Johnson
Nottingham celebrated its first sectional title since 2005 last season.Marisa Pankow
Oswego: “We’re excited for the season. We’re bringing everyone back. We lost no seniors last year. So we lost in the first round of sectionals last year, we want to make a sectional run and we want to win a playoff game. Obviously, we have to complete winning a playoff game before we can make a title run. That’s the ultimate goal. So hoping to finish about .500.” — Ryan Lavner
Syracuse West: “This year, we’re looking to improve on last year’s record. They had a lot of ups and downs last year. This year, we’re building a new culture, a new family, and a new system to be more successful.” — Antwan Ballinger
Watertown: “The outlook, I think, is good for our odds. I think we’re going to have more depth to our team, and I think that’s going to do us well. I think we have some good leaders for the team as well this year. So I think overall that we’re definitely going to be in the realms of improvement, and I think that we’re going to do well.” — Lucy Smoot
Games to watch
West Genesee @ Nottingham, 6:30 p.m. Dec. 19: The Bulldogs edged the Wildcats for the section title last season. They’ll play the other leg of the series in Camillus on Jan. 27.
Nottingham @ Henninger, 6:45 p.m. Jan. 9: Nottingham topped Henninger 46-38 in the sectional semifinals last season and both teams return large parts of their cores. The city foes also play at Nottingham on Jan. 22.
Teams in Class A
Camden (last season: 1-15), Central Valley Academy (13-9), Chittenango (9-11), Christian Brothers Academy (11-10), Cortland (5-15), Homer (7-13), Indian River (18-5), Jamesville-DeWitt (17-6), Mexico (5-10), New Hartford (12-9), Oneida (11-9), Phoenix (14-8), South Jefferson (12-10), Utica Notre Dame (19-4), Vernon-Verona-Sherrill (13-8), Westhill (11-8)
2025 Section III championship and state playoff finish: Utica Notre Dame def. Jamesville-DeWitt 47-24, lost to Franklin Academy 58-50 in sub-regional round
Central Valley Academy: “We have a really young team, a lot of eighth graders, ninth graders. Really strong players, though. But we have to definitely grow. We lost a lot of seniors last year, some of our key players, but I think we’ll have a really good, strong team this year.” — Anna Donahue
Chittenango: “I think that we’re going to be very scrappy. I think that’s what is going to be our identity. Yeah, our identity is going to be our defense. I think that we’re small but we’re going to be feisty. So I’m excited for that.” — Kassie Kleine
Christian Brothers Academy: “We got everybody returning except for our captain. It should be great this year. Tough defensive team and have a lot of fun.” — Mike Cariseo
Cortland: “We have big expectations this year. We return a decent core, and we’ve got some new people coming in and we actually still have some selections to make on who we may bring up, but we have changed our league a little bit, our division, and we are looking to be competitive and just cover some ground and kind of rebuild into some new expectations.” — Janice Meyer
Homer: “Obviously super excited. We have the majority of our team returning and coming back, a bunch of girls that I’ve had up since sophomores. We look good, athletic, more depth, able to play different styles of basketball that we played in the past and excited about that.” — Brad Sovocool
Indian River: “We lost four of our five starters. We have a pretty talented team, but I’m not going to say a rebuilding team, but it’s certainly going to look a lot different than it has in the last four years. In the last four years, we’ve been 81-13 with two sectional titles. So there’ll be a little bit of a drop off, but I think that our league’s going to be very competitive. We have a very tough non-league schedule with CBA, Cortland, West Genesee, ESM, so a lot of Syracuse schools. So we’ll certainly be tested.” — Jim Whitley
Jamesville-DeWitt: “We have pretty high expectations. We had a pretty successful season last year. We have different pieces coming in, but we have a pretty high standard at J-D and it doesn’t change year-to-year for us. We still expect the same out of our girls. So we’re really excited to get going next week.” — assistant coach Jordan Beers
Jamesville-DeWitt girls basketball will rely more on Miyoshi LaClair (2) this season as it attempts to get back to the sectional championship game.N. Scott Trimble | strimble@syracuse.com
Mexico: “The expectations that I have are attitude and effort every day, and just try to get better every practice, every game.” — Dominick Anthony
New Hartford: “So what we’re looking at right now is we have a lot of talented girls on our team. We’re really excited about what the season could bring. We have a lot of leadership, just not at the senior level, but also at the younger level. We have a good group of girls that will play really well together.” — Derek Richards
Oneida: “To definitely work hard together. Since we’re gonna have a smaller team, hopefully we can incorporate a good bond with that.” — Alexis DeGroat
Phoenix: “We look good, but we’re very young. A lot of positives. We have three returning players, two seniors. One of our top players, Lyla Duskee, she’s going to be our captain this year. Looking forward to a great season.” — Troy Washington
South Jefferson: ” I graduated five seniors last year. I have the rest of our team coming back, who are experienced players still. They got a lot of minutes last year. I have some young players who are joining us who are going to complement us very well. I think it’s going to take us a little bit to get the wheels aligned, but I think we could surprise some people.” — Michelle Whitley
Utica Notre Dame: “We have high expectations. We’re bringing everybody back, all five starters, everybody that played off the bench. So big target on our back. You have to focus on the little things; you have to go do it. You have to not get caught up in what could be, what might be, what’s at the end of the road. You have those big goals. We talk about big goals, but you have to do the little things day to day and stay focused to hopefully get to where we want to be.” — John Snyder
Vernon-Verona-Sherrill: “I’m looking to be competitive again, building on last year’s successes that we had in the young group in our program.” — Chad Hodkinson
Westhill: “We’re going to be really young. We’re going to be one of the youngest teams in Section III. But I’m really excited about what we got a lot of athleticism, and we’re losing a lot with our senior crew from last year, but there’s nothing wrong with being young. So I’m excited about what we’ve got coming up. We might have some growing pains here or there, but I’m really excited about what we got.” — Zach Kiggins
Games to watch:
Utica Notre Dame @ Bishop Ludden-Grimes, 7 p.m. Jan. 22: Catholic school takes on Catholic school in this star-studded matchup. Ella Trinkaus and company are looking to get some redemption this season after an early exit in the state tournament last season ended their repeat chances.
Jamesville-DeWitt @ Christian Brothers Academy, 7:15 p.m. Jan. 12: The Red Rams reached the sectional final last winter in head coach Randy Wright’s first season and just received possibly the best transfer in Section III in Liverpool’s Gia Kinsey, who earned All-CNY honors as an eighth grader last year.