Ruddy, Whiteford Run Into Record Book with Championship Rushing Attack
By
Geoff Kimmerly
MHSAA.com senior editor
August 25, 2023
Ottawa Lake Whiteford won its second Finals championship in 2022 with a power rushing attack that’s become expected of the program, but also with a record-setting quarterback leading the way.
Senior Shea Ruddy was added to the MHSAA record book for 4,461 yards and 52 touchdowns passing over four seasons, plus five touchdown passes in a half last season against Kalamazoo Loy Norrix.
Whiteford, meanwhile, made the record book for 664 points scored, 5,756 total yards and 87 total touchdowns, 4,515 rushing yards, 635 rushing attempts and 68 rushing scores. Whiteford’s 2021 team also was added for 64 rushing touchdowns, 5,468 total yards and 628 points after a Semifinal run. Ruddy is playing now at Hillsdale College.
See below for more recent updates to the 11-player record book.
11-Player Football
Portland lost a 39-34 heartbreaker to DeWitt on Sept. 1, 2022, but a pair of Raiders top a record book list for one of the game’s biggest highlights. Marc Nobis found receiver Chris Battley for a 99-yard touchdown reception, tying the record for longest scoring pass. Nobis was a senior, and Battley was a sophomore.
Rochester Hills Stoney Creek senior Quentin Ubaydi earned a record book listing for a flawless kicking performance last Aug. 25. He made all 10 of his extra-point tries in his team’s 70-0 win over Detroit Mumford.
The list of football programs with at least 500 wins over their histories is short – but growing. St. Joseph was added with a 563-376-34 record dating to its first season in 1913. The Bears also were added for 706 total yards in their Sept. 30, 2022, game against Portage Northern, a 62-49 win.
Walled Lake Western’s Jaxon Lippert became the 21st player to return a kickoff 99 yards for a touchdown when he did so against Davison on Sept. 30, 2022. Lippert is a senior this fall.
Kalamazoo Loy Norrix was part of one of the highest-scoring games of the 2021 season, and a pair of then-senior standouts earned individual record listings that day. Quarterback Tyler Roberts threw for 424 yards, and received Kevin Lucas had 223 yards and four touchdowns through the air, although Whiteford prevailed 76-40. Roberts is playing football and baseball at Hope College, and Lucas is playing football at Albion College.
Four decades later, Flint Kearsley standout John Yancer had been added for his 19 sacks over nine games in 1983, including five in the season finale against Flushing. Yancer was a senior that fall.
Holton quarterback Austin Fowler capped his high school career in a big way as a senior in 2021, making the record book seven times for passing – most notably for 2,265 yards, 153 completions and 33 touchdown tosses over nine games. He threw for 463 yards on 32 completions as Holton and Muskegon Heights Academy combined for 108 points that Oct. 30. He’s played baseball at Muskegon Community College this spring.
Tarik Ahmetbasic finished his high school career in 2022 having made 48 straight extra points dating back to the final game of his junior season, and he made the record book three times total for Clinton Township Chippewa Valley. He was added also for 87 extra points over 90 attempts over two seasons as the team’s point-after kicker, and for making all nine of his field goal attempts last fall. Ahmetbasic also just missed the career field goals list with 16 in 18 attempts, having kicked all 16 over the last two seasons after attempting one as a sophomore. He is continuing at Michigan State.
Boyne City seniors Jack Neer and Alex Calcaterra didn’t take long to make memories last season. Both made the record book in an opening 51-35 win over Benzie Central, Neer with seven touchdown passes (tied for eighth-most in a game) and Calcaterra catching five of those (tied for third). Neer signed with Hillsdale College, and Calcaterra is playing basketball at Michigan Tech.
Hudson’s 43-0 win over Blissfield on Oct. 8, 2021, was memorable for a few reasons. But arguably the most notable was achieved by the Tigers’ defense, which held Blissfield without a first down.
Mio’s Grant Price earned two listings over a month near the end of the 2010 season, rushing for six touchdowns in a win over Au Gres-Sims on Oct. 8 and then six again in a win over Cedarville that Nov. 5. He was a junior that season.
Mason set a school record for wins in finishing 12-1 last fall, and expectations are high again with junior Cason Carswell and senior Derek Badgley among returnees this season. Carswell was added to the record book three times including for 2,403 yards and 34 passing touchdowns, and Badgley was added for catching four of Carswell’s six touchdown passes in a Regional Final win over Trenton. Sophomore Collin Winters also was added after connecting on 58 of 62 extra-point tries, and the Bulldogs as a whole made the season scoring list with 554 points.
Senior Charlie Martyn joined a group of accomplished Ithaca kickers with his achievements over the last three seasons, earning record book entries for nine straight extra points in a game last fall, 53 extra points in 57 tries total over 11 games and 82 extra points in 95 tries over a three-year career with nearly all of those points coming as a junior and senior. He will next play baseball at Alma College. Ithaca also was added for holding St. Louis to only three first downs during their 2022 meeting.
A pair of Coopersville standouts capped their careers last fall with multiple entries in the record book. Four-year varsity quarterback Colton Bosch was added for 329 completions, 572 attempts and 4,574 passing yards, while three-year receiver Ryan Serba was added for 129 receptions and 1,975 yards for his career. Additionally, then-junior teammate Nick Gordon was added for 14 receptions in a game against Hudsonville Unity Christian on Sept. 9 and four touchdowns against Allendale on Oct. 7. Bosch will continue his career at Concordia-Chicago.
Semaj Morgan capped a magnificent three-season career at West Bloomfield last fall with four record book entries, most notably for his receiving. Morgan was added for 116 receptions and 1,876 yards over 34 career games, including 1,015 yards as a junior in 2021. He also earned a listing for a 100-yard interception return against Lake Orion last Sept. 24. He is continuing his career at Michigan.
Brandon Soltis completed his DeWitt football career in the fall with the career-record 207 extra points over his 47 games and four seasons – 46 more than the previous record holder. He drilled 55 of 57 tries last season to move to the top of the list, including a stretch of 38 consecutive. Teammate Bryce Kurncz was added for his 23 touchdown catches over 21 games and two seasons, and DeWitt as a team was added for 623 yards in a game against Grand Ledge, 5,056 yards over its 12 games for the season and for allowing only four first downs in its season-opening win over Haslett. Soltis is continuing at Hope College, and Kurncz is playing at Michigan Tech.
M'Khi Guy became the latest Muskegon star quarterback to reach the record book, doing so with six rushing touchdowns in his team’s 49-21 Division 3 Semifinal win over DeWitt on Nov. 19. Guy is a senior this fall.
A trio of Bloomfield Hills Brother Rice standouts were added for accomplishments last season or over careers that finished in 2022. Senior Henry Garrity made the single-game receiving yardage list with 225 against Warren De La Salle Collegiate on Sept. 16, and senior Griffin Pardi made the longest-punt list that game with a 72-yarder. Senior Owen Pardi finished his three-season varsity career last fall with 85 extra points in 95 tries. Jake Coulter also was added to the longest-punt list for his 71-yarder in 2020. Garrity is continuing at Notre Dame, and Owen Pardi is continuing at Sacred Heart University in Connecticut. Coulter plays baseball at Central Michigan.
Belleville kicker Brayden Lane made the single-season extra point list for the second time last season, connecting on 74 of 79 attempts. He’s also now on the career list with 126 in 144 attempts heading into his junior season this fall.
Edwardsburg continued to achieve among the state’s highest-producing offenses the last two seasons, ranking among the all-time leaders with 5,227 total yards, 4,634 rushing, and 89 total touchdowns with 78 rushing in 2021, plus 4,343 rushing yards in 2022. Trevor Houseworth was a senior on the 2021 team and made individual lists with 73 extra points in 79 attempts and a long punt of 81 yards. He’s kicking at Saginaw Valley State.
Reed City continued its run of success in 2022, finishing 11-2 and making the MHSAA record book with 544 points total including 73 touchdowns – with 54 rushing, 13 passing, four on special teams and two scored while playing defense.
PHOTO Ottawa Lake Whiteford quarterback Shea Ruddy takes a snap to start an eventual touchdown run during last season’s Division 8 Final at Ford Field.
Usually Called On to Contain Buzz, Rockafellow Ready to Make More Noise as Perry's Top Target
By
Geoff Kimmerly
MHSAA.com senior editor
August 21, 2026
PERRY – Two nests already were packed away in the back of his vehicle when Alex Rockafellow rolled up at 9:45 p.m. under an impressive find – a basketball-sized sphere hanging from a single thin branch over a driveway and filled with black and white-lined bald-faced hornets.
While most of us surely would have considered removing the nest daunting, the Perry senior saw an easy task compared to his usual searching around in the dark for a nest of insects he doesn’t want to startle. With the nest out in the open, all he had to do was snap the branch, drop the nest and its hundreds or hornets into an open pillowcase, and move on to the next collection.
Rockafellow spent five or six nights a week this summer driving around mid-Michigan working for the family business, Rock’s Free Yellow Jacket & Hornet Removal, which contains and takes away yellow jacket and hornet nests for free and sends the insects off to laboratories in Washington and Idaho where their venom is extracted to create immunotherapies to treat allergy patients.
That’s obviously not the typical high schooler summer job – and surely it’s unique among all-state football receivers and MHSAA record-holders. But he enters this season as all three, having earned all-state honorable mention from the Detroit News last fall and after tying the record for longest reception with a 99-yarder from teammate Zach Miller.
“I’ve taken some of my teammates on a few (nest) runs before. They think it’s a great time, and it’s really great getting to know each other,” said Rockafellow, a 6-foot-1, 170-pound pass catcher who reeled in 47 total for 882 yards and seven touchdowns as a junior. “Just looking for the nests, it’s really fun, (and) it’s cool to have two people looking for it. One time I took my buddy Miles, and he was the one who found the nest, and he was pretty surprised. He was like two feet from the nest when he found it.”
Opening night is a week away for 600 football teams across Michigan, and preseason practice the last few weeks has allowed Rockafellow to step away from his nighttime insect runs. Tales from his summer vacation are fascinating on their own, but the story of his climb the last five years from being uninterested in football to becoming a college prospect has its share of riveting details as well.
Rockafellow was an eighth grader during the fall of 2022, a quiet kid mostly hanging out at home “probably solving Rubik’s Cubes or reading books” and not nearly physically active enough for his dad Travis’ liking.
Alex had no interest in playing football, but Travis – who with wife Amy teaches in the Perry district – decided to reach out to a past student who was now serving as a middle school football coach. The middle school team at the time had 11 players – seventh and eighth graders combined – so Alex joined, giving the Ramblers 12 and some of his teammates a chance to take a breath.
He enjoyed that season enough to play again, entering high school a notable 6-foot tall but also just 123 pounds. He liked catching passes, didn’t love tackling, and so football remained just something to do during the fall – until the end of his sophomore season, when he moved up to varsity, and it was like he’d been stung (in a good way).
“I got a little taste of what it was like to play varsity, and I loved it,” Rockafellow recalled. “After that … (I) was just wanting more of it.
“(Football is) like an art. It’s just beautiful to watch it and see the plays unfold. Just understanding how to run routes against different defenders, where they are, and utilizing their leverage, how to attack that off the ball and how I’m going to break down.”
Intensely pursuing his role as artist, Rockafellow became a tireless worker, often found on Perry’s football field during the offseasons running routes by himself, even during breaks in winter weather. Despite suffering a broken collarbone at the end of that sophomore season, and then a busted wrist during basketball that winter, Rockafellow dedicated himself. It was during one of those football field training sessions before last spring when football coach Steve Bentley – also the school’s longtime and successful track & field coach – proposed Rockafellow give that sport a try. Over April and May, Rockafellow cut nearly two seconds off his 200 time, added four inches to his high jump and ran on the Ramblers’ 800 relay.
He’s hoping the improvements he picked up in running mechanics pay off on the football field. Another bonus: His big numbers from last fall – piled up almost entirely against double teams – came mostly on passes from now-senior quarterback Tyger Whitbeck.
They are two of only 16 players on the Perry varsity. But there are 25 players on the Ramblers’ JV, and Rockafellow’s commitment provides an example that may continue to pay off after he’s moved on.
“He’s the sort of kid who is setting the foundation. He doesn’t care about any of the individual stuff or whatever. The only time he cares about that is when it can help him get to the next level,” Bentley said.
Rockafellow has been generating interest among Division II football programs and been offered 2027 roster spots by four Division III teams. “Courtney (Hawkins) is a friend of mine, at Michigan State, and we went and did some hand-to-hand stuff off the line of scrimmage with him, and (Alex) absorbs everything,” Bentley noted. “It’s almost to the point where it looks like he’s not paying attention to you, and he’s thinking of five different things on how he can apply what you just told him.”
Rockafellow also carries a 3.9 grade-point average, so maybe entomology is in his future?
Actually, he’s hoping to follow in the footsteps of his dad, a physical education teacher at Perry’s upper elementary school who Alex has watched impact students in a way he’d like to continue – like when Travis secured a grant to purchase mountain bikes and taught kids how to ride them.
“We’ve never been those parents to say ‘you’re going to do this, we want you to do this.’ He’s gone above and beyond what we’ve expected from him,” Travis Rockafellow said. “The best way to describe Alex is he gets himself in the right place in the right time. He puts himself out there. I was never that confident and outgoing, but to watch him make the transformation from a shy kid to this, he’s exceeded my expectations, and I’m really proud of him.”
Alex said his future could also include permanently adding a third generation to Rock's removal service. As a sweat bee darted around his helmet Monday, he didn’t seem to notice. He’s been helping out his dad and grandfather since he was 5, and the eight or so stings he received this year haven’t hurt like they used to when he was younger.
Rockafellow also will leave his mark as one of the all-time top receivers at Perry, but would love to be remembered in a less measurable way. Despite being few in numbers, the Ramblers this season are a close-knit group, and he’s plenty confident they’ll improve on their one win from a year ago.
“I would love to be just a different kind of team, one that hates losing more than they love winning,” Rockafellow said. “Just trying to be our best and fighting for everything we can get.”
Geoff Kimmerly joined the MHSAA in Sept. 2011 after 12 years as Prep Sports Editor of the Lansing State Journal. He is a senior editor of MHSAA.com's editorial content and has served as MHSAA Communications Director since January 2021. Contact him at [email protected] with story ideas for the Barry, Eaton, Ingham, Livingston, Ionia, Clinton, Shiawassee, Gratiot, Isabella, Clare and Montcalm counties.
PHOTOS (Top) Perry’s Alex Rockafellow hauls in a pass last season while closely covered. (Middle) Rockafellow prepares to collect a nest Friday, despite nearly being stung. (Below) Rockafellow makes a move up field, also last season. (Photos courtesy of the Rockafellow family.)