McAlester Team Preview

Get 25% off your subscription by entering Knight25 in the coupon code area. Enjoy! It’s the month of July and that means it’s preview time! Throughout the month of July, we are publishing 100 team previews to get you ready for the 2022 season. This is something that began last year and has become even bigger and better this year. We’re looking forward to diving deep into the top teams across the state. From defending champs, to top contenders and dark horses, we’ll have complete coverage every single day with new teams from Class 6A down to A. In this post, we take a look at the McAlester Buffaloes. They’re determined to not only make it back to Edmond this year, but they want the gold ball after winning silver last year. McAlester Buffaloes (5A Preseason Ranking: #3) The McAlester Buffaloes were one of the more dominant teams in Class 5A and in the state last season but they came up just short of their ultimate goal, which was a state championship. The Buffaloes at this time last year were coming into the season as our preseason #1 team in Class 5A and Collinsville was right behind them at #2. Those two would stay in the 1 and 2 spot for the entire year and would clash in the state championship game. The Cardinals would come out on top in an instant classic. Fast forward to this year and the Buffaloes are still a top five team as they come in at #3 in our 5A preseason rankings. However, graduation has hit the Buffaloes hard and they’ll have quite a few new faces on both sides of the ball. Only five starters return on the offensive side of the ball but they’ll be boosted by the return of star running back [player_tooltip player_id="91049" first="Erik" last="McCarty"]. With McCarty being the only skill player returning, the Buffaloes will lean on him early on in the season as the new faces get brought along and become more comfortable within the offense. McCarty also leads five starters returning on the defensive side of the ball as he was one of their leading tacklers last season from the safety position. The same can be said about McCarty on defense as the Buffaloes will lean on him again and hope that he can speed up the learning process for those new starters and McAlester’s defense can return to "Black Death" form by the start of district play. <hr /> 2021 Results (13-1 Record - Class 5A Runner Up) Aug. 27 - Beat Broken Bow 39-7 Sept. 3 - Beat Sallisaw 57-6 Sept. 10 - Beat Ada 42-14 Sept. 24 - Beat Bishop Kelley 19-0 Oct. 1 - Beat East Central 62-6 Oct. 8 - Beat Durant 56-21 Oct. 14 - Beat Coweta 33-2 Oct. 22 - Beat Edison 52-17 Oct. 29 - Beat Shawnee 54-20 Nov. 5 - Beat Will Rogers 54-12 1st Round - Beat Sapulpa 48-14 Quarterfinal - Beat Guthrie 27-21 Semifinal - Beat Lawton MacArthur 42-13 Championship - Lost To Collinsville 42-35 <hr /> Key Losses To Graduation Avion Simon - Offensive Lineman Cale Prather - Wide Receiver/Defensive Back Chase Faber - Linebacker Killian Barnes - Wide Receiver/Defensive Back Lleyton Bass - Wide Receiver/Defensive Back Trent Boatright - Quarterback <hr /> Players To Watch [player_tooltip player_id="91049" first="Erik" last="McCarty"] - 2023 Running Back/Defensive Back No matter how many players graduated, McAlester brings back the best player in the state from last season in 2023 running back and defensive back [player_tooltip player_id="91049" first="Erik" last="McCarty"]. The Oklahoma commit was our 2021 winner of the Prep Redzone Oklahoma Player Of The Year award after a dominating season. We watched a lot of football last season and McCarty was the most dominant player who had absolutely insane production. Now that the Buffaloes have plenty of new faces on the offensive side of the ball, it’s not crazy to think that McCarty will have even more production this fall. That’s a scary thing for McAlester’s opponents. [player_tooltip player_id="154211" first="Malachi" last="Wrice"] - 2024 Tight End/Defensive Lineman McAlester 2024 standout [player_tooltip player_id="154211" first="Malachi" last="Wrice"] has been on the radar since his freshman season with McAlester. Wrice has looked the part since early on in his high school career and because of that, he was one of the earliest prospects we identified as top guys within the 2024 class. Wrice could be a variety of things at the next level. From offensive lineman to tight end or defensive lineman. It’ll be interesting to see what side of the ball Wrice ends up on and what position ends up being the most natural fit for him. But for now, Wrice will provide that versatility to the Buffaloes as they have several new faces on both sides of the ball. More Names To Follow [player_tooltip player_id="38793" first="Chaz" last="Bradley"] - 2023 Athlete Eli Chatman - 2024 Wide Receiver/Defensive Back <hr /> 2022 Schedule/Games To Circle Aug. 26 - Broken Bow Sept. 3 - Scotlandville, LA. (@ Shreveport’s Independence Bowl) - McAlester is the latest Oklahoma team to participate in the "Battle On The Border" in Shreveport, Louisiana. Booker T Washington recently participated in that showcase event and the Buffaloes will be heading down this fall. McAlester will play Scotlandville out of the Baton Rouge area on a Saturday morning at 11AM. Scotlandville has one of the better quarterbacks in Louisiana and will provide the Buffaloes, especially the Buffalo defense, with a significant challenge early on in the season. McAlester was originally supposed to play Sallisaw in week one but after the Black Diamonds dropped the game, this showcase event came together. Sept. 9 - Ada Sept. 23 - Memorial Sept. 30 - AT Del City - Week five brings the halfway point of the regular season and the start of a brutal two-week stretch where McAlester will face their two toughest district opponents and both come on the road. Up first is a road game against Del City, who’s moved down to 5A from 6A-2. This will be arguably the toughest challenge for McCarty and the McAlester offense as they go against a Del City defense that has multiple players that will be playing D1 college football. The Buffaloes will have to travel to Del City, which is not an easy place to play and it’ll be a must win to stay in the district title conversation. A loss and McAlester will need some help. Oct. 7 - AT Coweta - A week after traveling to Del City, the Buffaloes will hit the road again for a top five match-up against Coweta. Both teams are in the preseason top five for Class 5A and this should be one of the better games in this district. The storylines write themselves as these two teams simply do not like each other. It began two years ago when Coweta beat McAlester on the road in 2020 and Coweta players took pictures in front of the Buffalo statue. The bad blood continued last year following McAlester’s dominating win over Coweta and McAlester players attempted to do the same with a Tiger statue. Something tells us that the bad blood is still there. Oct. 13 - East Central Oct. 21 - AT Durant Oct. 28 - AT Sapulpa Nov. 4 - Glenpool <hr /> Notable McAlester and Collinsville squared off in the Class 5A state championship game and it ended up being one of the best games of the year. While the Buffaloes would fall short, they were still apart of an instant classic. Running back [player_tooltip player_id="91049" first="Erik" last="McCarty"] locked up the award for 2021 Prep Redzone Oklahoma Player Of The Year with his performance in the championship game. But Collinsville’s "big three" of Andrew Carney, Brayden Gilkey and Oscar Hammond were too much for McAlester to overcome and the Cardinals were able to rally in the second half and get the win. Anytime you have a classic game like that one, one team is always on the losing end. There’s no doubt the Buffaloes have been using that throughout the offseason to motivate them. <hr /> Championship History 2 State Championships 1988 - Beat Altus 13-3 1968 - Beat Stillwater 42-14