PUEBLO – All season, the Stratton High School football team has been dominating in the 6-man ranks.
That didn’t change on a frigid Saturday afternoon in the 6-man state championship game.
Senior Cyler Notter ran in four touchdowns and recovered two fumbles, leading the Eagles to a resounding 69-14 victory over Cheyenne Wells at the ThunderBowl on the Colorado State University-Pueblo campus.
“We were hoping for this,” the 6-foot-2, 185-pound Notter said. “We have been working hard all season and it was just fun to do one more year of football with my brothers. We just work hard in practice and rep after rep we get better. This feels amazing.”
Notter was named the game’s National Football Foundation Most Outstanding Player.
Stratton finished the season with a perfect 13-0 record. Stratton won its eighth outright football state title and second in a row. Stratton, while as a co-op with Liberty, also won two state crowns to make it just the fifth school in state history to have reached 10 state titles in football.
Stratton has a 27-0 record the past two seasons on the gridiron. The Eagles also punted just once in the last two years. Cheyenne Wells ended its season with an 8-6 record. CW also lost its first game of the season 65-16 to Stratton on Aug. 26.
“The last time we lost was on this field to that team – Cheyenne Wells (in 2021),” Stratton coach Jesse McConnell said. “A lot of these guys were sophomores, real young and it kept them hungry, and it just turned out we saw (Cheyenne Wells) again to end their career. They were fired up (Saturday) and this was a fun way to end their career.
“All offseason they lift, and they always want to get better. They aren’t satisfied. The just want to play Stratton football for four quarters. They don’t care what the score is. They just want to play the same way and that’s awesome to see them do that.”
It didn’t take long for Stratton to get going.
Notter burst up the middle for a 56-yard TD on the first offensive play of the game.
“Our coach said, ‘Come out fired up,’ because they were going to come out fired up because they wanted to beat us,” Notter said. “We just came out fired up and did our job.”
On the next possession, Stratton’s Brody Webb chugged in for a 37-yard score to make the score 16-0 with eight minutes left in the first quarter. Webb, a junior, finished the game with five TDs.
“It is the energy in the beginning,” Webb said about the key to the Eagles’ success. “The kickoff right from the start we are hitting people. That’s all there is to it. We knew no one could stop us if we did our job.”
Notter kept up the barrage with a 48-yard score at 6:02 of the first quarter to stretch the lead to 22-0.
Notter stayed in the spotlight with his third TD – this one from 27 yards – to make the score 28-0 with 1:44 remaining in the first quarter.
On the next Cheyenne Wells possession, Notter recovered a fumble by running back by Trey Sheler.
Moments later, Webb zoomed in for a 12-yard score to make the score 35-0 in favor of the Eagles.
Cheyenne Wells did get on the board when QB Perry Chadwick tossed a 9-yard TD pass to Corey Hill on fourth-and-goal with 6:44 until halftime.
Stratton answered late in the first half with a 1-yard plunge from Webb to keep the Eagles soaring with a 42-6 advantage.
Cheyenne Wells kept battling and got within 42-14 on a 2-yard TD pass from Chadwick to Hill with eight seconds left in the second quarter.
The second half began in similar fashion for Notter as he recovered a fumble at the CW 5-yard line after a snap went over the head of QB Chadwick. That led to a 2-yard score by Webb at 7:53 of the third. That pushed the score to 48-14.
Chadwick was injured on the following possession and did not return.
Notter cruised to a 48-yard TD – his fourth of the game – to make it 55-14 with 6:06 on the third-quarter clock.
Webb claimed his fifth TD of the game on a 13-yard reception, making the score 62-14 at 1:55 of the third.