A lot of people out West are starting to get excited about the Zags playing Pac-12 basketball, but high school mascot fans back East might prefer some positive Obezags news.

That’s definitely true at Key High School in Maryland, home of the only Obezags in the country.

Over the next couple of months, SBLive/SI will be featuring the best high school mascots in every state, giving readers a chance to vote for No. 1 in all 50.

Vote: Best high school mascot in Louisiana

Vote: Best high school mascot in Maine

The winners and highest vote-getters will make up the field for our NCAA Tournament-style March Mascot Madness bracket in 2025. The Coalinga Horned Toads (California) are the defending national champions.

Here are High School on SI’s top 10 high school mascots in Maryland (vote in the poll below to pick your favorite):

The poll will close at 11:59 p.m. ET Wednesday, Oct. 23.

“Camp Hill,” the site of the present-day Allegany, was a federal army camp during the Civil War, and Allegany High School honors that history by calling themselves the Campers.

Known as “the Seafood Capital of the World,” the city of Crisfield has a giant crab on its welcoming water tower. The Crisfield Crabbers were a minor league baseball team in the 1920s and ’30s, and the high school decided to keep the name alive.

These aren’t just any ducks, they’re Mallards. And they aren’t just any Mallards — they’re Fighting Mallards.

No, Forest Park’s mascot isn’t a Subaru. It’s a bearded burly guy wearing a beanie and swinging a mean ax. Notable past Foresters are Mama Cass Elliot and former Vice President Spiro Agnew.

North Hagerstown went from one interesting mascot to another, switching from Little Heiskell to Hub. The new name stems from the historical and geographical location of Hagerstown at the intersection of waterways, railroads and interstate highways. Little Heiskell, named for German tinsmith Benjamin Heiskell,is an iconic weathervane in Hagerstown.

Michigan has the only Martians in the country among U.S. high schools, and Bryn Mawr has the only Mawrtians. Mascot pride is brimming at the 140-year-old school.

When the property on which the school was built was donated, it was filled with gazebos. The students voted and decided to spell gazebo backwards as their nickname. Not surprisingly, they’re the only Obezags in the country.

This unique school with a unique mascot started in 2015 with 100 ninth-graders, and it’s grown by 100 students each year since. The only requirement to apply to become a Sea Turtle is that English is not your first language.

Not only are these the only Wildebeests among U.S. high schools, they have a fantastic back story. From the school website: “The Wildebeest was a character from an original operetta written by former music teacher Bryan Seith and performed by SSFS students during the school’s early years. At some point after the production, a student thought it would be funny to bring the Wildebeest costume head to an SSFS game to cheer on the team, and eventually SSFS adapted the wildebeest as our School mascot!”

The most clever use of the letter E in high school sports history resulted in Wilde Lake having a deceptively unique mascot. There are 743 U.S. high schools that call themselves the Wildcats, and there’s only one Wildecats.

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— Mike Swanson | swanson@scorebooklive.com | @sblivesports