Maybe Luther Richesson has finally found a home.<\/p>\n
The West Alabama quarterback set a Red Tails Classic record for completion percentage (64 percent) and passing touchdowns (three), earning Most Valuable Player honors after leading his Tigers to a 27-17 win over Tuskegee at Cramton Bowl on Sunday night.<\/p>\n
The Nashville native led his Lipscomb Academy team to a state championship in 2021, but from there his journey takes more wrong turns than right. He signed with Cincinnati, then entered the portal before the 2022 season started. After sitting out 2022, he played at Golden West College in 2023, went to Middle Tennessee State in 2024 (where he didn\u2019t play) and Central Arkansas in 2025 before finally winding up at West Alabama this fall.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s been a long run, for sure,\u201d he said. \u201cI\u2019ve been just about everywhere. I joke every time when you see those commitment graphics online and see like eight different schools and all the comments, \u2018What\u2019s this kid doing? The portal is ruining football,\u2019 I\u2019m one of those kids. In a lot of ways, I\u2019m grateful for it. It\u2019s been a wild ride. A lot of lessons I\u2019ve learned in each spot I\u2019ve been. I just told Coach (Scott) Cochran on the way (to the postgame interview) I\u2019m so thankful and so blessed to be at West Alabama.\u201d<\/p>\n
The Tigers piled up 411 yards with a breakout fourth quarter, but much of what they accomplished on Sunday can be directly tied to Richesson. His first touchdown pass of the night was a perfect strike over the middle to Maddix Morris to give West Alabama a 14-7 halftime lead. And when the game started unraveling in the third quarter, it was Richesson who put it all together in the fourth quarter to help the Tigers put the game out of reach.<\/p>\n
\u201cI thought he played great,\u201d Cochran said. \u201cEveryone, to start, the anxiety was very high. And I\u2019ve got to find a way to settle them down to play a full four quarters. He\u2019s definitely got a long way to go but I see that he has a chance where he is.\u201d<\/p>\n
In the first half, he did a lot of damage with his legs, finishing with 93 yards on seven carries, the most ever by a quarterback in a Red Tails Classic.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019ll do whatever it takes,\u201d he said. \u201cI\u2019m not the fastest quarterback in the world but I think I can get it done when we need it. That\u2019s just what it took tonight.\u201d<\/p>\n
In the second half, there was a missed field goal and a fumble out of the back of the end zone that cost West Alabama points on two occasions, followed by a Richesson interception.<\/p>\n
It was actually his second interception of the night. The first was negated by the fact Tuskegee had 12 men on the field.<\/p>\n
\u201cHe threw an interception and they had the penalty,\u201d Cochran said. \u201cI was like, \u2018you\u2019re a lucky dog.\u2019 I\u2019m smiling at him, joking with him, \u2018ha, you\u2019re lucky, you finally got one,\u2019 and then he threw the next one. \u2018Man, I shouldn\u2019t have thrown it.\u2019 I\u2019m like, no, this is what happened, let\u2019s go to the next play. You\u2019ve got to go sit for the next few minutes, however long it takes the defense to get the ball back. So how you\u2019re going to respond when you come back out is more important than you throwing that pick.\u201d<\/p>\n
From that moment, he completed 5 of 5 passes for 82 yards and a pair of touchdowns, helping the Tigers build a 27-9 lead to put the game out of reach.<\/p>\n
\u201cOn offense — I can only speak from my end — we saw the defense battling,\u201d he said. \u201cThey were really competing. They played a hell of a game. That (Tuskegee) offense made some amazing plays tonight and (the West Alabama defense) held them to few points. I think it just kicked in for us, let\u2019s help our brothers out, let\u2019s go do our part and make sure we can get some points on the board as well.<\/p>\n
Richesson completed 16 of 25 passes for 215 yards and three touchdowns, setting Red Tails Classic records for completion percentage and touchdown passes (as well as quarterback rushing totals). Most importantly, he led his new team to a win in the 2026 season opener.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt was a great way to start the year, 1-0. We faced some adversity early on in the game and then some self-inflicted wounds coming out of the half. I was just really proud of the guys. We all had each other\u2019s backs tonight, especially through some adversity, and found a way to get it done.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Maybe Luther Richesson has finally found a home. The West Alabama quarterback set a Red Tails Classic record for completion percentage (64 percent) and passing touchdowns (three), earning Most Valuable Player honors after leading his Tigers to a 27-17 win over Tuskegee at Cramton Bowl on Sunday night. The Nashville native led his Lipscomb Academy […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":10,"featured_media":4582,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-4581","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\n