Poll of final National High School Polls 2025-2026 season
Ontario Christian consensus #1!
April 15, 2026
Below is a poll of the various final national high school polls. For the first time in a few years, there was consensus at the top with Ontario Christian #1 and Bishop McNamara #2.
Kaleena Smith of Ontario Christian (CA). (Photo courtesy of Overtime Select)
The system used is simple. A school gets 25 points for a first-place finish down to 1 point for a 25th-place finish in a poll. Where the points were tied, MaxPreps (which did not include academy/prep schools having a separate national poll for them) is only included in breaking ties indicated by a *. With three polls (ESPN, Sports Illustrated and The Sporting News) used, the maximum point total a school could have is 75 points (obtained by consensus #1 Ontario Christian out of California). Links to all polls (including our tiebreaker MaxPreps) are below.
From the numbers, there was very strong agreement on the first few. Toward the lower portion of the poll, there was significant divergence of opinion.
Despite Bishop McNamara beating Ontario Christian during the regular season, Bishop McNamara’s loss in the Maryland Private School Championship final to Bullis, while Ontario Christian was winning the prestigious CIF Open title over Archbishop Mitty caused the final placement.
Biship McNamara opted not to play beyond the Maryland Private School final although both Chipotle Nationals and The Throne would gladly have taken them. The 2025-2026 season was a normal year in that a team had to win its last game to be #1 nationally. Like most years if you did not finish #1 in your state playoffs, you would fall short of the top spot in the final national poll. In rare years, a team’s regular season resume could be so strong (Long Island Lutheran a few years back), a loss at season’s end really should not prevent a #1 national finish.
Chipotle National versus The Throne
Chipotle Nationals is a sanctioned high school event which unfortunately only a limited number of direct State Associations (most significantly Arizona, DC, Florida, Georgia, Nevada, Utah and Washington) allow participation. Most significant not allowing in recent years are California’s CIF and Texas’s UIL. This year only one direct federation school (Bishop Gorman of Nevada) participated. Non-federation DME Academy was the winner and thus moving up to composite fourth from further below in all polls.
The Throne is technically a club event with all teams wearing ‘Throne jerseys.’ All players on the teams are from that school’s high school team. Yet, if you ask most high school coaches, they will say Throne results should not count toward ranking. I am certain that Sports Illustrated and The Sporting News polls factored in those results while MaxPreps did not. ESPN possibly did but just a little. One could argue this all day as to considering The Throne results or not. St. John Vianney jumped significantly in the Sports Illustrated and The Sporting News polls due to players from the school winning The Throne.
Poll results breakdown:
Eleven (starting with #1 Ontario Christian) are private state federation schools. Bishop McNamara and Bullis fall in this category as Maryland approved non-member schools. Eight are public schools led by Princess Anne of Virginia at #11. Seven (led by #4 DME out of Florida) of the schools are teams that made the MaxPreps National Top Ten Poll (non-state series Federation schools, academies and preps). Public school Oostburg (out of Wisconsin) was the only team from the MaxPreps Small Town Top 25 to make this list coming in at #26 on tiebreak for #22-26. It is very rare for a smaller public school to be able to challenge for overall national top 25 honors.
Untimely passing of BlueStar Media pollster Chris Lawlor
Near the end of the regular season, BlueStar Media high school sports (did many sports with girls’ basketball just one) poll writer Chris Lawlor passed away unexpectedly. With his passing, the publication ceased high school poll activity (at least for now). One thing Chris did with his poll was to recognize additional high school teams regionally besides the list of 25, thus giving more schools recognition. Prior to BlueStar, Chris had a long stint doing high school polls for USA Today.
Poll links
ESPN:
Sports Illustrated:
Sporting News:
MaxPreps (*-counted for tie-breaks only) Top 25:
MaxPreps National Top Ten:
Final poll of poll (* star indicates a tie broken by MaxPreps ranking placement; schools receiving vote total of less than seven points are not listed):
1. Ontario Christian (all 3 first place votes) – 75 points (Private Federation)
2. Bishop McNamara – 72 (Private Federation)
3. Archbishop Mitty – 67 Private Federation)
4. DME – 62 (MaxPreps National Top Ten)
5. Red Bank Catholic – 57 (Private Federation)
6. Bullis School – 55 (Private Federation)
7. Incarnate Word Academy – 51(Private Federation)
8. Sierra Canyon – 50* (Private Federation)
9. St. John Vianney – 50* (Private Federation)
10. Long Island Lutheran – 49 (MaxPreps National Top Ten)
11. Princess Anne – 48 (Public)
12. St. James Performance Academy -44 (MaxPreps National Top Ten)
13. Johnston – 36 (Public)
14. Sage Hill – 35* (Private Federation)
15. Etiwanda – 35* (Public)
16. Westtown School – 34 (MaxPreps National Top Ten)
17. Hoover – 31 (Public)
18. Legion Prep – 22 (MaxPreps National Top Ten)
19. Bishop Gorman – 19 (Private Federation)
20. Friends’ Central – 15 (MaxPreps National Top Ten)
21. SPIRE Academy – 14 (MaxPreps National Top Ten)
22. Lancaster – 10 (Public)
23. Pleasant Grove – 7* (Public)
24. Miami Country Day – 7* (Private Federation)
25. Putnam City North – 7*(Public)
26. Oostburg – 7* (Public)