The Albert Lea Grizzlies football team lost Saturday in the Southern Plains Football League championship game to the South Central Hawgs 26-6 in Truman.

Grizzlies president Craig Schmidt said the heat index was 110 degrees at the 7 p.m. kickoff, and the team wasn’t as prepared to play in the heat as the Hawgs.

“We needed to play mistake free,” Schmidt said. “We did not. We made mistakes on all sides of the ball and cost ourselves the game.”

The Hawgs and Grizzlies were the playoffs Nos. 1 and 2 seeds, respectively. Each team had a 7-1 regular-season record but the Hawgs beat the Grizzlies 24-20 on May 21 at the Southwest Middle School field to earn the tiebreaker.

This was the Grizzlies second season as Albert Lea’s amateur football team.