MSA Sports Big Game Hunting – Week Four

By: HSSN Staff
Wednesday, September 18, 2013 | 2:23 PM

Week four brings with it the time to separate the wheat from the chaff in the WPIAL football season. You might get to this week with a pretty nice looking record based on some favorable scheduling. Time is running out on teams dodging the upper echelon of their section. Sooner or later , you are going to run into a playoff caliber football team, if it is sooner, it will be this week, if it is later it will be next. But, after Friday we will know a lot more about who will be playing in November and whose seasons will come to a grinding halt before trick-or-treat time has even arrived.

AAAA Southeastern Conference:
Upper Saint Clair Panthers (3-0)(3-0) vs Penn Hills Indians (3-0)(3-0)  Friday September 20^th at 7:30 PM @ Yuhas-McGinley Stadium in Penn Hills, Pennsylvania. Broadcast on the MSA Sports Network by Sam Hall and Greg Warnock

Penn Hills appears poised for a much more Penn Hills like season than we have seen from them lately. The Indians missed the playoffs entirely last year and have not made it past the first round of the post-season since 2009. That is a long dry spell for Indian fans who had come to expect to be in the mix all the time prior to the exodus of Neil Gordon.

The ground game has been huge for 2^nd year head coach John Peterman, who has his Indian running backs running as fast as they can. (Fortunately, they are not wearing Italian cap toe oxfords. Sophisticated yet different; nothing to make a huge fuss about.) If you don’t get that parenthetical sentence, I apologize.

 Back to that Penn Hills running game. It is powered by a serious dynamic duo. The Indians so far in 2013 have rushed for 1346 yards as a team. The Indians’ dynamic duo is young, sophomore quarterback Billy Kisner has carried the football 52 times for 568 yards and five touchdowns. The second leading rusher for Penn Hills is junior Isaiah Jones who has 42 attempts and 438 yards, and has scored five touchdowns of his own.

Kisner has not had quite as much success throwing the ball completing 25% of his passes for just under a hundred yards, but he really has not had to throw it much. Senior wide receiver Shawn Featherstone is the top pass-catcher on the year for Penn Hills with a pair of catches.

Featherstone is a great defensive back who had a 73 yard interception return for a touchdown against Peters in week two. 

Upper Saint Clair has powered to a 3-0 start under Jim Render, winning a close one in week one over Woody High 16-10 before blowing out Canon-Mac and Peters by a combined 88-0.

Senior quarterback Joe Repischak has completed 21 of 37 passes (57%), for 347 yards and a score.

The Panthers spread the love in their ground game, led by senior Trevor Morrow who has rushed for 164 yards and scored five touchdowns. Morrow is the only Panther to rush for over a hundred yards on the season, but there are seven Panthers with 30 or more yards rushing.

USC and defense have been pretty synonymous over the years and that is the case again this season with the Panthers posting back-to-back shutouts and allowing an average of  3.3 points per game so far. The test in this game will be the varied rushing attack of the Penn Hills Indians.

AAA Greater Allegheny Conference:
Mars Planets (2-1)(2-1) at Highlands Golden Rams (3-0)(3-0) Friday September 20^th at 7:00 PM  @ Golden Rams Stadium in Natrona Heights, Pennsylvania. Broadcast on the MSA Sports Network by Pete Blais and Brandon Showers 

Mars has rebounded from a tough week one loss at home to Franklin-Regional with back-to-back blow out wins over Derry and Indiana. The Planets have a lot of returning talent and I still fully expect them to be a big time player in AAA before all is said and done. This game really is huge for all the contenders in this conference. If the planets can find a way to win a tough one on the road here they get themselves and Franklin-Regional back in the picture of hoping for a tri –championship at the end of the season. A win for Highlands really would put the Golden Rams firmly in the GAC driver’s seat for a solo title.

After the week one loss versus F-R when the Planets only gave there monster running back Josh Schultheis 10 carries, Scott Heinauer clearly decided 10 was not enough. In week two Schultheis carried 26 times and in week three 30. His total totes for the year are now up to 66 for 520 yards and seven touchdowns. Look for a lot of Schultheis, especially if Mars can get an early lead in this game. Quarterback Owen Nearhoof has not been throwing much completing 12 of just 26 passes for 345 yards and three scores. Nearhoff will also need to be a little more careful with the football, to try and cutback on the interceptions, he has thrown five already this year.

Keep an eye on tight end Nolan Skirtich he is a big strong kid with great speed and hands, he creates match-up problems for opposing defenses and Nearhoof has a big strong arm, and an affinity for Skirtich, to whom he has completed 50% of his passes for the year.

For Sam Albert’s Rams, get ready to watch the Elijah Jackson show. This junior is not a big kid (5’7’’ 140 pounds) but man is he a workhorse with some great quicks, great moves and surprising power. He has amassed 67 carries on the season for 520 yards and three touchdowns.

Junior quarterback Blake Leri is a dual threat for Highlands. Leri has completed 13 of 38 passes for 276 yards and four scores without tossing an interception. He has also rushed for almost a hundred yards on the season.

Deion Fletcher and Allan Cratsenberg will look to make some plays in the passing game when Leri wants to throw, The Highlands defense has made steady improvement through the season. They allowed 14 points in week one to Hollidaysburg, seven in week two to Hampton and pitched a shutout last week in Murraysville against Franklin-Regional.

AA Midwestern Conference:
New Brighton Lions (3-0)(2-0) vs Aliquippa Quips (3-0)(1-0) Friday September 20^th at 7:00 PM @ Carl Aschman Memorial Stadium on the campus of Aliquippa high school. Broadcast on the MSA Sports Network and WMBA-AM 1460 by Bob Barrickman and Kerry Lacey

Get your popcorn ready and your scoreboard operator. Two tremendous offenses will be in “The Pit” Friday night. New Brighton is opening eyes all around the WPIAL with an impressive 3-0 start including putting up 64 points on perennial Midwestern powerhouse Beaver in week two.

Senior quarterback Gabe Greco  is amongst the WPIAL leader in passing yards, having completed 38 of 50 passes for 750 yards and seven touchdowns on the year. He has also contributed on the ground rushing for 163 yards and another four scores.

Greco’s favorite target is Craig Thompson who is near the top of the WPIAL with 13 catches for 344 yards and a pair of scores. Jesse Sabol has also caught 13 passes and scored a pair of touchdowns for the Lions this year.

Junior running back Scott Florence has emerged as a huge threat in the ground game for New Brighton with 63 carries for 492 yards and four touchdowns on the year.

If the Lions’ offense can keep up the pace they have set this year (over 50 points per game on average offensively) it will be a very impressive display against the number one team in AA. The problem is, even if the Lions can get the offense going, can they find a way to stop the Quips? Or even slow them down? New Brighton is allowing over 30 points per game, they will need a dramatic improvement there to hang in this battle.

The Quips have been, well, the Quips for the first three weeks of the year. They are a team that I don’t think will be challenged through the season to be frank. Terry Swanson, Dravon Henry and Kazeon Pugh have combined for 797 yards and score 15 touchdowns on the year.

Darrien Fields has completed 18 of 27 passes in his first three weeks as starting quarterback, for 271 yards and fours scores without throwing an interception.

There are probably not a lot of people outside the New Brighton locker room that give the Lions a chance in this game, but we have seen some crazy things in sports. I think of this as a big game for the Lions, not in terms of winning, although I have no doubt they will lay it all on the line, but moreso in terms of hanging around and getting the feel of how they stack up against the cream of the crop in the WPIAL. If they can keep this game close and build off the confidence that might provide, keep an eye on New Brighton they might make a lot of noise in the playoffs.

A Black Hills Conference:
Monessen Greyhounds (2-1)(2-1) vs Clairton Bears (3-0)(3-0) Friday September 20^th at 7:30 PM @ Neil C. Brown Stadium in Clairton, Pennsylvania. Broadcast on the MSA Sports Network by Troy Clardy and Mike Krcil

It seems like every year I think this match-up is going to be a big game and the Bears find a way to just roll. Did Monessen get caught looking forward to this game last week when they were knocked off by Fort Cherry? I will leave that up to you to decide but from what I saw I think Fort Cherry is just a pretty darn good football team.

One thing for sure is the Hounds will need to play much better defense if they hope to become streak-stoppers. The Bears amazing run continues at 66 and counting. New faces, same results for Tom Nola so far, although many reports say the Bears had their troubles last week against California in a 32-7 win. Those though are the kinds of troubles you want to have (the ones in a 32-7 win).

Aaron Matthews missed a lot of that game with an injury, if he cannot return the task might be a little more achievable for the Greyhounds and Andy Pacak.

The ‘Hounds will have to be more careful with the football. They turned it over four time in the loss to Fort Cherry and allowed the Rangers to recover an onsides kick. Clintell Gillaspe and Javon Brown are big time offensive threats for Monessen both running with and catching the football. Noah Rullo threw for almost 200 yards in the loss to Fort Cherry.

The Bears’ defense has been, as usual absolutely phenomenal all season long allowing just a California touchdown in week three so far. They are allowing an average of 2.3 points per game. The trio of Lamont Wade, Jojaun Bray and Aaron Matthews has accounted for 10 touchdowns on the season for Clairton. It says here the streak will continue until at least Heinz Field. But, since when has it ever mattered what it says here?

Tags: Aliquippa, Clairton, Highlands, Upper St. Clair