Coaches from across Alabama have released their All-State boys’ soccer selections for the 2022 season, and players from Baldwin County programs earned a heavy share of the recognition, highlighted by six local athletes named to the Super All-State first and second teams.
The Super All-State roster, which pulls the state’s top players from every classification into a single honor squad, placed three Baldwin County-area players on the first team. Daphne’s Henry McMurphy and Noah Miller joined Davidson’s Kidomo Albert and Baronyi Kengeye among the first-team forwards and midfielders, while Bayside Academy contributed midfielder Joey Jones and defender Ty Ferguson to the first unit.
Bayside Academy also placed the most players of any local program on the Super All-State second team, with goalkeeper Blai Cebrian and midfielder Luke Ferguson earning honors. They were joined by Gulf Shores midfielder A.J. Davis, Fairhope midfielder Matthew Stroud, Davidson midfielder Jonah de Lange, and forwards Mason Brown of St. Luke’s and Gideon Garcia of Faith Academy.
Beyond the individual honors, Bayside Academy head coach Jamie Ferguson was recognized as Coach of the Year for the state’s private and parochial schools, capping a season in which the Admirals were among the area’s top programs in the smaller classifications.
The classification-by-classification All-State teams reflected similarly strong showings from Baldwin County. In Class 7A, Daphne head coach Heath Burt was tabbed Coach of the Year, with McMurphy, Miller and Stroud joined by Davidson’s Albert, Kengeye and de Lange on that classification’s roster. Gulf Shores’ Davis and McGill-Toolen’s Dominic Piccini were recognized in Class 6A alongside St. Paul’s forward Grayson Myles.
Faith Academy placed two players, Garcia and Branson Phelps, on the Class 4A-5A team, while Bayside Academy dominated the Class 1A-3A selections with six honorees: Joey Jones, Luke Ferguson, Ty Ferguson, Hoke Fellers, Zach Smart and Cebrian. St. Luke’s added Mason Brown and Ricky Hernandez-Sexton to that same classification’s list.
The All-State announcements came on the heels of the final statewide coaches’ poll of the season, which showed several Baldwin County programs among the top-ranked teams in the state in both the boys’ and girls’ rankings. On the girls’ side, Daphne finished second in the season’s final Super Poll behind Mountain Brook, with Fairhope also cracking the top 15. In Class 6A, Spanish Fort was ranked among the state’s top teams, finishing seventh in the classification poll.
On the boys’ side, Fairhope landed at No. 6 in the final Super Poll and No. 6 in the Class 7A rankings, while Bayside Academy was ranked 15th in the boys’ Super Poll and Spanish Fort appeared in the Class 6A poll at No. 7. The final polls, compiled from coaches’ votes across the state, generally lined up with the results on the field, as teams that won state championships were tabbed the No. 1 team in their classification.
The recognition caps a soccer season in which Baldwin County’s public and private schools alike fielded some of the state’s most competitive rosters, with several of the honored players expected to anchor their programs again when fall workouts begin ahead of the next season.