Scholastic Notebook – 06/22/2012

By: HSSN Staff
Friday, June 22, 2012 | 9:01 AM

Joe Dunn was known as one of the good guys among WPIAL basketball coaches. But that fraternity is now minus one good guy.

Dunn resigned as Trinity High School’s boys coach last week. He wouldn’t rule out returning to coaching someday, but for now, he wants to spend more time with his family. Dunn and his wife have two daughters and a son.

Dunn has been coaching for 26 years and had other successful coaching stints at Mount Pleasant and Seton-LaSalle. Dunn became pretty good at taking down programs and turning them into more than respectable. He did it at Mount Pleasant and he did it at Trinity, where he was coach since 2001.

Trinity has only six wins in WPIAL playoff history and Dunn has four of them. His teams made the playoffs in 2002, 2003, 2009, 2010, 2011 and 2012. His teams made it to the WPIAL Quarterfinals for the first time in school history in 2009 and duplicated the feat this year.

The only other time Trinity won a WPIAL playoff game was 1984 when the WPIAL had an open tournament. The Hillers won two that season. Trinity also made the PIAA playoffs twice under Dunn.
Dunn was 128-125 at Trinity. He was a head coach for 26 years overall and had a 324-286 record.

Top Coach Returns

While Dunn steps down, the winningest coach in Pennsylvania high school football is coming out of retirement and returning to the sideline.

George Curry, who built Berwick into a perennial power in Eastern Pennsylvania, has been named Berwick’s new coach. He takes over for Gary Campbell, who recently resigned to become an athletic director and coach in Massachusetts.

Curry, age 68, has 413 career wins, tops in Pennsylvania history and this Berwick job is supposedly only for one season. His last coaching job was at Wyoming Valley West from 2006-08. He was at Berwick from 1971-2005, where he won six PIAA championships. He started his career at Lake-Lehman in 1967.

South Park’s Stanley Honored

This is no surprise. South Park javelin thrower Bill Stanley has been selected the Gatorade Pennsylvania Boys Track and Field Athlete of the Year.

Stanley had an unforgettable senior year, capping it off by not only winning a state championship, but also setting a national record.
Stanley even got recognized in Sports Illustrated recently as he appeared in the magazine’s “Faces in the Crowd” section.

Stanley will throw the javelin for Ohio State next year.

Still Undecided

Valley senior shortstop Zarley Zalewski was selected by the Pirates in the 40th and final round of the Major League Baseball draft. But Zalewski still hasn’t made a decision whether or not to sign with the Pirates. He already had signed with Kent State and seems to be leaning toward attending college.

Lucky Seven

Central Valley football player Robert Foster, ranked as one of the best receivers in the country, recently announced his final list of seven colleges. They are Pitt, Alabama, Michigan, Michigan State, Ohio State, Oregon and USC.

More Recruiting

The Pitt football team has seven recruits in the class of 2013 – and three are from the WPIAL. South Fayette receiver Zach Challingsworth was the most-recent WPIAL player to choose Pitt.
Challingsworth made his decision last week and ended an unusual recruiting story. Challingsworth made a verbal commitment to Toledo on a Monday. But four days later, he committed to Pitt.

Challingsworth didn’t have a scholarship to Pitt when he chose Toledo. But the Panthers offered him a day after his commitment. Challingsworth then waited a few days before accepting Pitt’s offer.

In other recruiting news, two Montour lineman backed out of verbal commitments and chose Temple. Matt Barone had committed to Connecticut, but then accepted a Temple scholarship. His decision didn’t come long after fellow lineman Tyler Haddock backed out of a commitment to Kent State and accepted a Temple scholarship.

Rogers to Gateway

Ricky Rogers’ whirlwind saga of high schools has taken another turn. Now Rogers is enrolled at Gateway.

Rogers is one of the top players in the WPIAL class of 2013. He was a receiver as a freshman and sophomore at Keystone Oaks and already has a scholarship offer from Rutgers.

Although Rogers lived in the Keystone Oaks school district, he was home schooled. But in the spring of his freshman year, he enrolled at Lincoln Park and attended school there, although he continued to live in the Keystone Oaks district. He eventually left Lincoln Park, though, and was home schooled again while living in Keystone Oaks.

Gateway coach Terry Smith said Rogers will now live in the Gateway school district. However, he will continue to be home schooled.

Besides playing football, Rogers also is a talented basketball player, starting as a freshman and sophomore at Keystone Oaks.

From WPIAL to Olympics

A few former WPIAL athletes will be in the Olympics later this summer, and the list could grow by one more this weekend.

Montour graduate Cassidy Krug is in first place in the womens 3-meter diving heading into Saturday’s finals. The top two make the U.S. team.

Two former WPIAL wrestlers already are on the Olympic team – North Allegheny’s Jake Herbert and Waynesburg’s Coleman Scott.

Also, McKeesport grad Swin Cash has been selected to the U.S. womens basketball team for the second time. The other time was 2004. Cash is playing for the Chicago Sky in the current WNBA season. She is averaging 9.7 points, 4.8 rebounds and 2.1 assists a game.

Tags: Central Valley, Gateway, Keystone Oaks, Valley, Waynesburg Central