High School Football: Gibraltar Tops Gillett

Gibraltar evened its record to 1-1 with a 52-26 win over Gillett in an MONLPC-8 football matchup Thursday.

The Vikings led 20-18 at halftime, but outscored Gillett 32-8 in the second half to pull away.

Luke Steebs completed 9 of 15 passes for 280 yards and five touchdowns. Alex Laughlin caught six passes for 243 yards and three touchdowns. Laughlin’s scoring receptions were 63, 57 and 50 yards long. Steebs’ other scoring passes were to Marcus Reinhardt and Brandon Stillman, each from 9 yards out. Sam Lindenburg added a 13-yard scoring strike to Stillman.

“Based on the playing time that Luke had last year against Gillett when Trvor [Reinhardt] went down, we as a staff knew Luke had all the ability to lead this team,” Gibraltar coach Mike Peck said. “I honestly did not know that Luke and Alex were going to click quite this quickly.  What they built tonight gives them a lot of confidence moving forward for the balance of the season

Stillman rushed 14 times for 95 yards and Steebs added 68 on 13 attempts. Stillman and Connor Duffy each had 10 tackles.

The Vikings fell to Florence 54-6 in their opener August 23. Steebs scored the Vikings’ touchdown in the first quarter on a 6-yard run. 

Steebs completed 6 of 12 passes for 111 yards and rushed five times for 43 yards. Stillman caught four passes for 94 yards and recorded nine tackles.

“For our team this was a great game for us in week two,” Peck said. “We really went back to some basics during the week and the team responded well tonight.  I think the second half of the game showed our grit and determination as we were focused on the things we could control in this game.”