Football: Dow’s Partlo headed to Grand Valley

by Jason Wolverton

When Grand Valley State University football coach Chuck Martin showed up in his living room, Kyle Partlo thought he had a pretty good idea of where his chances stood of becoming a Laker.

Turns out, his hunch was dead on.

Martin and co. made an offer in late December and the Dow High standout accepted, verbally committing Partlo to play football at Grand Valley this fall.

“My sister goes to Grand Valley, so I’ve been really familiar with the campus and have been to a lot of games,” Partlo said. “I’m just so excited about going to a school with such a great history and one that expects so much out of its players.”

Grand Valley is one of the nation’s most prominent Division II football programs, with the Lakers having won four national championships since 2002. Martin, who has been at the helm for two of those championships, is 61-5 in five years as head coach.

Partlo worked out along with other prospective student athletes at Grand Valley’s facilities in early December, and a member of the coaching staff who handles recruiting in the Saginaw Valley League said Partlo had a great workout. Not long after, Partlo got a call that Martin would be making a visit and the coach spoke with him and his family for several hours about the program and where Kyle possibly fit in.

On Dec. 20, he officially got the offer and accepted on the spot.

Partlo will head to Grand Valley after a 2008 season in which he continued to prove himself a dual-threat quarterback. In earning an All Saginaw Valley League Honorable Mention, Partlo rushed for 620 yards and four touchdowns, while throwing for 528 yards and six more scores.

Numbers alone don’t tell the story, though, according to former Dow coach Kurt Faust. Faust says Partlo is an athletic talent with big upside who took big strides this season in the one area of quarterbacking that matters the most.

“Kyle’s leadership was something that we really wanted to work on and impress upon Grand Valley because that’s an asset,” Faust said. “Kyle developed as a great leader for us and took that to task…we’re really happy that he was able to keep the boat afloat, especially when we struggled.”

For his part, Partlo credits Faust for the development in that leadership and for helping him gain the opportunity to play at the next level.

“My career at Dow definitely prepared me to go to GVSU and prepared me for college football,” he said. “Coach Faust did a great job of preparing me for the next level and getting me noticed, and I couldn’t thank him enough for that.”

Partlo will officially sign a letter of intent on national signing day, which is Feb. 4. He says he wants to major in engineering, but is yet undecided as to what specific field of engineering that will be.