Kingsley football defeats Almont in MHSAA Division 6 championship
DETROIT - The Kingsley Stags (12-2) defeated the Almont Raiders (12-2) 38-24 in the Division 6 Michigan high school football state championship on Saturday at Ford Field.
Kingsley had almost 400 yards of offense, and more than 300 of it came on the ground. It is the first Kingsley football state title since 2005.
Kingsley scored the first points of the game with a three yard touchdown run from senior running back Eli Graves. Neither Graves nor the Stags would slow down, as they would enter halftime up 22-10 thanks to three touchdowns from Graves.
Graves finished with 216 total yards and four touchdowns on 34 touches, and he also added three tackles as a defensive back. Graves said he did it for his brother, Owen.
“I wear number two because my brother wore number two,” Graves said. “He never got to finish his senior season because they had to forfeit due to COVID. We always tried to play our hardest for that team because they never got a chance to do what we just did.”
Five different Kingsley players recorded tackles for loss, and senior defensive back Jon Pearson led the way with 1.5. Senior running back and linebacker Skylar Workman had 68 rushing yards to go with his two tackles and half tackle for loss.
Almont only lost one game all season prior to Saturday. Coming into the state final, Almont was giving up less than four yards per carry.
Against the Stags, the Almont defense gave up almost six yards per carry.
Almont head coach James Leusby said they just couldn’t do anything about it.
“(It was) nothing that we didn’t prepare for,” Leusby said. “They were just more physical off the ball than us. Defensively we got pushed back a little and we haven’t faced that all year, so hats off to them.”
Senior Almont running back and linebacker Ayden Ferqueron had a game-high 15 tackles to go with 24 rushing yards and a touchdown.
Junior Almont running back and linebacker Chase Battani had 13 tackles as well as a team-high 77 rushing yards and one touchdown.
