Penn Hills playmakers shine in Northern Conference win over Kiski Area

By: HSSN Staff
Saturday, September 22, 2018 | 12:15 AM

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Lightning reached the Penn Hills area at halftime Friday night, but the electricity came well before that.

Although Kiski Area did its best to match Penn Hills’ wealth of playmakers, the Indians showcased why those players make them one of the top contenders for the WPIAL Class 5A championship.

Daequan Hardy caught three touchdown passes from Hollis Mathis and returned an interception for another score, Terry “Tank” Smith ran for four touchdowns and No. 2 Penn Hills reeled off constant big plays on offense on its way to a 64-28 victory over Kiski Area in a Northern Conference game at Yuhas-McGinley Stadium that lasted nearly five hours because of a lengthy weather delay.

“Tank, once he gets to the next level, he’s hard to bring down, but when you’ve got a team playing man-to-man defense and turning their backs to the ball, he gets to the next level and has the breakaway speed to get out of there,” Penn Hills coach Jon LeDonne said. “Hardy’s just a special individual. He flies around. If they want to press him, he’s going to run by them quick.”

Mathis passed for 332 yards and three touchdowns, including 270 yards in the first half alone, and added a 30-yard rushing touchdown. Hardy finished with 158 yards on four catches, including scores of 8, 45 and 60 yards and Smith rushed for 184 yards and touchdowns of 1, 8, 53 and 59 yards on 15 carries for Penn Hills (5-0, 3-0), which piled up 595 offensive yards and a season high in points.

Kiski Area played some man and some zone defense but couldn’t find the right formula.

“You know our game is to bring heat,” Kiski Area coach Sam Albert said. “We blitzed, and (Mathis) stepped out of it, and now they’re on the perimeter and they’re a quality football team.

“… They’re hard to match because they can run and throw.”

Only a weather delay caused by lightning and an ensuing downpour, which went into effect midway through Kiski Area’s halftime band performance and lasted more than two hours, could slow the Indians.

The game, which began a half-hour early at 6:30 p.m., ended at 11:18. The teams were whistled for a combined 30 penalties, 21 by Penn Hills.

“Tough one coming back out after such a long break,” LeDonne said. “We try and occupy our guys’ time and get back into the mentality of a varsity football game with pretty much silence in the stands. We made a lot of mental mistakes there at the end, in the second half. We’ve got to correct that, that’s for sure.”

The Indians offense overshadowed another prolific passing night from Kiski Area senior quarterback Ryne Wallace.

Wallace, who came into the game as the leading passer in Class 5A, passed for 214 yards, two touchdowns and two interceptions. He threw 42 passes — 34 in the first half alone — and completed 23, 10 in a row at one point of the second quarter. Dane Fitzsimmons and Garret Polka caught second-quarter touchdowns.

Ethan Guercio replaced Wallace midway through the third quarter and passed for 88 yards and a 7-yard touchdown to Troy Kuhn. Drew Dinunzio-Biss added a 2-yard rushing score, but the Cavaliers also threw three interceptions and turned the ball over on downs three times inside Penn Hills territory.

At times, Kiski Area and Penn Hills traded scores, but by that point the Indians already held a multiple-touchdown advantage.

“I was proud of our kids,” Albert said. “They never quit. As you saw, they never quit, they came back and responded. But they’re a good football team. We had times where we were in the right position and just didn’t make the tackle.”

Penn Hills showed its big-play ability right off the bat, as Mathis hit Hardy for a 45-yard gain down to the goal line on the Indians’ fourth play from scrimmage. Smith powered in on the next play for the opening score.

Kiski Area responded with a drive inside the Penn Hills 40, but on third down, Hardy intercepted Wallace’s pass and took it back 66 yards for another score. It was his second straight week with a pick-6. A 45-yard scoring strike from Mathis to Hardy made it 20-0 in the second quarter before Kiski Area got on the board.

Penn Hills faces Armstrong next week, and Kiski Area hosts Hampton.

“It’s one game,” Albert said. “We’ve got a bunch left. We’re excited to get back home and get back into conference.”

Doug Gulasy is a Tribune-Review staff writer. You can contact Doug at dgulasy@tribweb.com or via Twitter @dgulasy_Trib.

Tags: Kiski School, Penn Hills