It doesn’t matter what class, division or conference a basketball team plays in — a state championship berth feels just as great.

The Cook Inlet Academy girls earned a spot in the Class 1A State Championship game by defeating Newhalen 44-27 on Tuesday at the Sullivan Arena in Anchorage. For CIA, it is their second consecutive state title game, as they nearly won the 2A girls championship last year.

CIA coach Rustin Hitchcock said although the sting from last year’s game is still felt, this year’s squad is a much different animal.

Cook Inlet Academy continued its roll through the Alaska School Activities Association Class 1A state girls tournament by defeating Klawock 46-37 on Monday at the Sullivan Arena in Anchorage.

The win avenges a loss at the hands of the Chieftains in mid-January and eliminates the pre-tournament favorite from title contention.

“We just beat the No. 1 team in state,” CIA girls coach Rustin Hitchcock said. “We beat them last year, but they have a 2-to-1 advantage on us since I’ve been coaching. It’s been going back and forth.

One year ago, the Seward girls basketball team made the trip to the state tournament, while the Seward boys did not.

This year, the boys are back in on the action, and the two teams are going together again, like they did two seasons ago in 2011.

The Seward girls played last year to a seventh-place finish in the Alaska School Activities Association Class 3A tournament after two straight days of losses, which left them wanting more. The Seahawks are returning to state for the third straight year.

At last year’s Alaska School Activities Association Class 2A basketball tournament in Anchorage, the most glaring numbers on the Nikolaevsk girls team roster were the ages. The team had no upperclassmen and six eighth-graders.

The squad surprised some folks by winning its first game at the tournament against Tok before dropping two consecutive games and finishing fifth.