2022 Southern Arizona high school football schedules — Empire Ravens

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4A

EMPIRE RAVENS

2021 RECORD: 5-6

• Empire showed much promise in its development under George Kelly in 2021 after playing only one game in 2020 because of COVID-19 protocol. The Ravens went 5-6, winning three straight games in October before falling short in their last two games.
• The non-region schedule starts with the Sept. 2 opener with visiting Rincon/University. After a bye week in the second week — many of the schools have an early bye week at that time — Empire plays two teams from the Phoenix area. The Ravens first host Phoenix Sierra Linda on Sept. 16 and then play at Glendale Deer Valley on Sept. 23 — two schools that were a combined 15-6 last year. Sierra Linda finished 8-2 overall and 5-0 in the 4A Copper Sky region last year but did not have enough power points to qualify for the state playoffs. Deer Valley was 7-4 after losing in the first round of the 4A state playoffs to eventual champion Casa Grande.
• A home game against Sahuarita on Sept. 30 will be followed with a game at Rio Rico on Oct. 7 to close out the non-region schedule.
• Empire then enters its 4A Kino slate with games at Mica Mountain (Oct. 14), Douglas (Oct. 28) and CDO (Nov. 4) and home games against Vista Grande (Oct. 21) and Pueblo (Nov. 11).

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ALLSPORTSTUCSON.com publisher, writer and editor Javier Morales is a former Arizona Press Club award winner. He is a former Arizona Daily Star beat reporter for the Arizona basketball team, including when the Wildcats won the 1996-97 NCAA title. He has also written articles for CollegeAD.com, Bleacher Report, Lindy’s Sports, TucsonCitizen.com, The Arizona Republic, Sporting News and Baseball America, among many other publications. He has also authored the book “The Highest Form of Living”, which is available at Amazon. He became an educator five years ago and is presently a special education teacher at Gallego Fine Arts Intermediate in the Sunnyside Unified School District.