Readers cast almost 15,000 votes this week, and they have selected Whitesboro junior Connor McDonald as the area’s top returning high school football player.
McDonald and 10 other returning 2024 New York State Sportswriters Association all-state selections were placed on a ballot for online readers of the Observer-Dispatch and Times Telegram, and McDonald, who ran and caught passes for 1,551 combined yards and 27 touchdowns in his first varsity season and ran an interception back for another score, received 8,224 of the 14,736 votes cast (55.8%).
Whitesboro won its first 13 games last fall on the way to a second consecutive Section III title and a second appearance opposite Section I Somers in New York’s Class AA championship game.
Kicker Simon Kichuk and lineman Kevin George, McDonald’s senior Whitesboro teammates, finished second and fifth in the voting with 19.5% and 2.9%, respectively. Frankfort-Schuyler seniors Jerome Bowen (15.3%) and Sebastian Veloz (4.6%) were third and fourth.
Eleven all-state football players from the 2024 season return to the Mohawk Valley gridiron for 2025.
The 11 players — three in Class A, two in Class B, one each in classes C and D, and four for eight-player teams — were selected by the New York State Sportswriters Association, and we are now asking online readers of the Observer-Dispatch and Times Telegram which of them they think will be this season’s top performer.
Voting is open at uticaod.com and timestelegram.com until Friday at noon, with results to be posted later Friday.
Included on the ballot are the following players:
Junior CONNOR McDONALD and seniors KEVIN GEORGE and SIMON KICHUK from Whitesboro’s two-time defending Section III Class A champions who played in a second consecutive state championship game last fall. McDonald ran for 743 yards and 13 touchdowns and added 14 more scores on 32 receptions in his first varsity season, working behind a veteran line that included George. Kichuk, who recorded two sacks on defense, saw action at running back on offense, kicked 65 extra points as a junior and kicked his first varsity field goal in the sectional semifinals.
Senior quarterback JOHN VITULLO and receiver PEYTON WAY have been starters on back-to-back Class B sectional finalist teams at New Hartford. Vitullo passed for 1,772 yards and 22 touchdowns in 2024 with Way on the receiving end of 52 passes, 13 of them touchdowns. The numbers were similar when they were sophomores: 1,709 yards and 24 touchdowns for Vitullo, and 13 touchdowns among 33 receptions for Way, who led the Spartans with 796 yards, a number that bumped up to 845 last fall.
Canastota quarterback MASON ROBERTS threw for 1,036 yards and ran for 410 as a junior.
Versatile Mt. Markham junior JAMISON YOUNG, selected by the sportswriters on defense, ran for 481 yards and nine touchdowns, caught two scoring passes, intercepted five passes and recovered a fumble. He also kicked a game-winning field goal in overtime in a sectional playoff victory.
MASON MARLAND ran for 1,144 yards and 18 touchdowns as a junior for a Morrisville-Eaton team that reached the eight-player sectional finals.
Frankfort-Schuyler, the team that beat Morrisville-Eaton on its way to an unbeaten run through the state playoffs, returns seniors JEROME BOWEN, THOMAS SERVICE and SEBASTIAN VELOZ. Bowen scored 14 combined touchdowns rushing and receiving on offense and led the Maroon Knights with 108 tackles and 11 sacks on defense. Veloz anchored the team’s offensive and defensive lines, and Ferguson saw action along the lines and at tight end.
All-state selections from the area last fall included several players from the class of 2025 who have moved on, including Frankfort-Schuyler quarterback Martino Rocco, the eight-player player of the year. Other graduated all-state selections were Frankfort-Schuyler’s Lionell Coulthurst, Michael Ferguson and Philip Tangorra; Morrisville-Eaton’s Carter Highers; West Canada Valley’s Jack Stewart and John Tubia; Clinton’s Ben Copperwheat; Waterville’s JP Hafelin; Dolgeville’s Trever Borst, Grayson Eggleston and Bryce Mosher; Mt. Markham’s CJ Jones; Adirondack’s John Hennessey; New Hartford’s Jake Garcia, Wilkenson Joseph and Jake Rockford; Oneida’s Austin DeGroat; and Whitesboro’s Memphis Ferguson.
This article originally appeared on Times Telegram: Readers pick Mohawk Valley’s top returning high school football player
Reporting by Jon Rathbun, Herkimer Times Telegram / Times Telegram
USA TODAY Network via Reuters Connect
