There is enough pressure involved in being a No. 1 seed in the boys’ basketball tournament.

But this year? In Class A East? Safe to assume that there will be some sleep-deprived nights in Edward Little coach Mike Adams’ house this week.

“I don’t know if we are (the best team in the state) or not. I see these top-10 polls,” Adams said. “Every team has a goal to win a state championship, and these guys have since they were seventh and eighth-graders, but I don’t want them to feel like they’re failures if they don’t.”

Heal Points became official Sunday morning, setting the field for the eight regional tournaments. Preliminary round games will be played Tuesday and Wednesday, weather permitting, with quarterfinals beginning Friday in Augusta, Portland and Bangor.

Thirteen local boys’ teams have qualified for the fray, with six already assured of quarterfinal berths. EL (17-1) is the lone No. 1 seed among them, edging three-time defending regional champion Hampden by virtue of come-from-behind road wins over Cony and Lewiston this past week.

The Red Eddies await the winner of the Mt. Ararat at Brewer prelim (9:30 p.m. Saturday, Augusta Civic Center), and either way it will be no cakewalk. EL beat Brewer 54-49 and edged Mt. Ararat 54-53 during the KVAC regular season. In a rematch with the Eagles, the Eddies won by 35.

“There are a lot of good teams in Eastern A,” Adams said. “We didn’t know if we would go one or two, but if we lost, we knew we would be two and we might play Oxford Hlls. Are you kidding me?”

EL has been the No. 1 seed twice previously in Adams’ 14-year tenure and experienced extreme results, falling victim to a quarterfinal upset by Hampden in 2007 and storming to the regional title two years later.

Since that loss to the Broncos, the Eddies are 7-0 in quarterfinal games. They own the same record in contests decided by five points or fewer this season.

“We have seen how hard that it is to do it, and for anybody else to say they can and they will, they’re fooling themselves,” Adams said. “The odds are stacked against you. It’s tough. You’ve got to have a little luck. You’ve got to play really well. You’ve got to be healthy.”

Ian Mileikis and Lew Jensen lead the Eddies. Each is making his fourth appearance in the tournament. Mileikis, who missed most of last season with a broken leg, scored 43 in Tuesday’s 81-80 overtime win over Cony.

“They’ve played together since third grade. One of their moms made a poster the other night showing them in third grade together, and being a dad of a fourth-grader, it was like, wow,” Adams said. “They play together. Our guys don’t play AAU here, there or other places. We stick together. There’s something to be said for that.”

In other Saturday Class A East quarterfinal clashes in Augusta, No. 6 Oxford Hills takes on No. 3 Messalonskee at 4 p.m. and No. 4 Lewiston confronts No. 5 Cony at 8 p.m.

Lewiston makes its fifth consecutive appearance in the quarterfinals. The Blue Devils beat the Rams in two donnybrooks this season, 77-69 and 63-61.

“Two great ones. They only play entertaining games. It will be a good matchup,” Lewiston coach Tim Farrar said. “We get Tykeem (Gaines, point guard, out recently with a sprained ankle) back. We’ll figure out who needs to get the ball.”

Oxford Hills-Messalonskee is a battle of two of the state’s top players, the Vikings’ Andrew Fleming and Eagles’ Nick Mayo. Messalonskee won the lone previous meeting, 55-42. Oxford Hills reached the regional final from the No. 6 seed a year ago.

Class C West is a similarly loaded bracket.

No. 1 Boothbay (16-2), No. 2 Dirigo (16-2) and No. 4 Winthrop (15-3) battled for the top seed throughout the season. The Seahawks snagged it by virtue of a 64-44 rout of the Ramblers Friday night.

The Cougars have won 11 consecutive games, including second-half comebacks against Boothbay, Winthrop, No. 5 Madison and No. 6 Hall-Dale. Dirigo needs a healthy Riley Robinson. The junior, who already has 1,300 career points, is battling a bad back.

“He couldn’t move. He gutted it out in there,” Dirigo coach Travis Magnusson said after the season-ending win over Hall-Dale. “Basically he couldn’t do more than walk. We’re going to have to do some things the next week and rest him, and hopefully we can get him out of it.”

It would be foolish to overlook defending regional finalists Waynflete (15-1) and Maranacook (7-11), who are lurking at No. 3 and No. 8, respectively.

Maranacook hosts St. Dom’s (10-8) Wednesday in a rematch of the Black Bears’ 72-51 prelim win a year ago. The Saints are 9-4 in their past 13 games, extending their streak of playoff appearances to 10 years, but they have lost in the play-in round every year since 2010.

In other Class C prelims, No. 12 Mountain Valley (9-9) travels to No. 5 Madison (15-3) and No. 10 Monmouth (9-9) visits No. 7 Old Orchard Beach (11-7). Madison edged Mountain Valley by 5 and 7 points in their two MVC meetings. Monmouth seeks its third consecutive quarterfinal appearance.

Winthrop will draw the Madison-Mountain Valley winner. Teams are not reseeded after the opening round.

Spruce Mountain (11-7) has advanced to the Class B West quarterfinals at Portland Expo in all four years of its existence. The No. 5 Phoenix hope a beefed-up KVAC schedule helps get them over the top against No. 4 Lake Region in a 3 p.m. Saturday semifinal.

No. 9 Gray-New Gloucester (8-10) and No. 10 Poland (8-10) each face road prelims. The Patriots make their first showing since 2011 in a trip to Fryeburg, while the regional reigning champion Knights go to Greely, the team they toppled in last year’s regional title game.

Rangeley (6-11) and Buckfield (5-13) earned Class D West prelims. Late-season wins over higher-ranked Richmond and Vinalhaven vaulted the No. 8 Lakers to a home game against NYA. The No. 12 Bucks hope the third time is the charm against No. 5 Richmond, which won the regular-season games by 18 and 22 points.

Other No. 1 seeds around the state are Portland (16-2) in Class A West, Yarmouth (15-3) in Class B West, Medomak Valley (16-2) in Class B East, Calais (16-2) in Class C East, Forest Hills (18-0) in Class D West and Washburn (16-2) in Class D East.

koakes@sunjournal.com

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