How to watch every game in the 2023 Maine high school basketball tournament

By Larry Mahoney, Bangor Daily News Staff

The Maine high school boys and girls basketball tournaments will again be streamed live online this season with three organizations sharing the coverage.

The National Federation of State High School Associations (NFHS) Network will carry the quarterfinal round games in both the North and the South regions for four of the five classes.

The Class AA quarterfinals, which begin Tuesday, will not be streamed because those games are at campus sites rather than at one central venue.

But WHOU will carry the Class AA quarterfinal game between Deering High of Portland and Bangor at 6 p.m. Thursday at the Red Barry Gym in Bangor.

WHOU will carry the regional semifinals and finals in all five classes and the Maine Public Broadcast Network and its Maine Public’s World Channel will broadcast the 10 state championship games.

There is a monthly fee of $10 for the WHOU livestreams and $11.99 a month to subscribe to NFHS Network.

Fred Grant, the owner and chief executive officer for North Maine Media Inc., the parent company of WHOU (100.1 FM in Houlton), said in addition to the regional semifinals and finals, his on-air talent and crews will be working many of the quarterfinal games for NFHS.

“We are a true sub-contractor in that way,” Grant said. “[NFHS] tells us what they want, how they want the broadcasts to go and we use their graphics and everything.”

Grant’s crews will be doing the 24 quarterfinal games in Bangor and the 16 in Portland while NFHS will be responsible for the 24 in Augusta.

With the exception of Class AA, quarterfinal contests begin Friday in Bangor, Portland and Augusta.

The Class AA North and South semifinals and finals will be held at the Cross Insurance Arena in Portland, while the Class A South and B South quarterfinals, semifinals and championship games will be held at the Portland Expo. 

The Class A North and C South and D South tourney games will be at the Augusta Civic Center. The Cross Insurance Center in Bangor will host the Class B, C and D North tournaments, beginning with the quarterfinals.

The Class A state championship games will be played at the Augusta Civic Center on Friday, March 3, at 7 p.m. for girls and 8:45 p.m. for boys.

The remaining state championship games will be contested on Saturday, March 4.

The Class B girls and boys state title games will be at 1 and 2:45 p.m., respectively, at the Cross Insurance Arena in Portland, and the Class AA games will be held there at 7 p.m. for the girls and 8:45 p.m. for the boys.

Bangor’s Cross Insurance Center will have the Class D girls game at 1 p.m. followed by the D boys contest at 2:45 p.m. The Class C girls state championship game will be at 7 p.m. followed by the boys game at 8:45 p.m.

Maine Public Television will rebroadcast the games on Sunday, March 5, and the games will also be available online.

This is the final year of the three-year deal between WHOU and the Maine Principals’ Association.

Grant said he is “definitely interested” in a contract extension with the MPA if the MPA wants them to continue.

“We just haven’t had that conversation yet,” Grant said.