Maize’s season ended with a tough loss — a 60-59 five-overtime overtime thriller against in the playoffs — but the Eagles were rewarded with a number of postseason honors after finishing the year 7-3.

Maize’s season ended with a tough loss — a 60-59 five-overtime overtime thriller against in the playoffs — but the Eagles were rewarded with a number of postseason honors after finishing the year 7-3.
“It’s kind of heart-breaking going into five overtimes. It’s hard not to have a bitter taste in your mouth, but overall it was a good season,” junior quarterback Connor Lungwitz said.
The goal for next year is to “work hard in the off season, put together a good team, try to repeat what we did in the off season and do even better,” Lungwitz said.
Eleven players received postseason awards. Lungwitz received the All-League, All-Metro, Wichita Eagle All-Class, Topeka Capital-Journal All-Class and HovpenSports.com awards. Nick Benford received the All-League, Wichita Eagle All-Class and Topeka Capital Journal All-Class awards.
Other players that received awards were: seniors Clayton Norrod, Chase White, Kavan Jobe, Gage Morgan; and juniors Kendall Stewart, Elijah West, Dalton Rupp and Jared Luebbe
“We all improved greatly since last season. It was quite amazing. I didn’t think we were going to get as far as we did. When we started winning games and didn’t stop winning games, I felt like we could probably do this,” Benford said.
The players think the team went further this year due to a closer bond with teammates.
“There was a lot of chemistry with our team this year and it helped,” Lungwitz said.
Although the team is still disappointed with their loss, they reached their goal of winning district and making state playoffs.
“We wanted to get as far as we could and farther, and we actually did,” Benford said.