Bruising McKeesport running back Spell spells trouble for Gateway

By: Chris Harlan
Friday, October 13, 2023 | 11:54 PM

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McKeesport fullback Keith Spell was losing steam on a 79-yard touchdown run, so the senior turned, stiff-armed the nearest tackler to the ground and continued into the end zone.

That pretty much summed up McKeesport’s offense Friday night as the Tigers’ running backs bullied their way to a 38-28 victory over Gateway in a nonconference win in Monroeville.

The Gators surely weren’t expecting Spell’s big night or his stiff-arm.

“That’s my move,” he said. “I always hit that. I’m too slow, so he caught up to me. I was watching him, he got close, I had to stick him.”

The 6-foot-2, 255-pounder was somewhat of a secret weapon for the Tigers, who only recently moved Spell from tight end to running back. He had only a couple of carries per game before now, mostly in short-yardage situations.

Spell scored twice Friday and proved tremendously hard to tackle on runs up the middle. Tigers running backs Kemon Spell, his younger brother, and Anthony Boyd also reached the end zone as McKeesport rushed for 416 yards.

But leading the way was Keith Spell, who rushed for 202 yards on 24 carries and scored on runs of 79 and 1 yard.

“That was about as simple as it gets,” Gateway coach Don Holl said. “They said, ‘Let’s take our great big defensive end and keep handing him the ball.’ It became a very different game.”

Gateway quarterback Brad Birch completed 27 of 40 passes for 414 yards and a touchdown, but the Gators were hurt by three turnovers, two in the red zone. Wideout Steven Jenkins had 12 catches for 197 yards, and Kenny Lewis had nine catches for 169 yards and a touchdown.

McKeesport is traditionally a running team, so no one was surprised to see that. But rather than rely on speed and misdirection, the Tigers often opted for power football and an I-formation.

“It’s hard to stop when you have a big bruiser,” McKeesport coach Matt Miller said. “He kept hitting for big yards, so we kept rolling with it. He had more carries tonight than his whole career here.”

The outcome won’t affect playoffs standing because McKeesport (7-1) and Gateway (4-4) play in difference classifications nowadays, but this matchup is still a rivalry for the teams.

Boyd rushed for 133 yards and a touchdown on 18 carries, and freshman Kemon Spell scored twice, once rushing and another on a 92-yard kickoff return.

“Kudos to our offensive line,” Miller said. “We knew that was our strength coming into the season. … They were coming over and relaying information, saying ‘Hey, we could hit this hole or that hole.’ I know it looks like we’re running the same thing all the time, but it’s a little different.”

McKeesport took a 17-14 lead in the second quarter on a 39-yard field goal by Nathan Kendrick and never trailed after halftime.

Gateway never went away, but the Gators’ chances were hurt most by miscues in the red zone. They lost two fumbles inside the 5-yard line and had another drive end with a failed fourth-down pass at the 1.

“You’ve got to be able to punch it in, and we didn’t,” Holl said. “And then we fumbled on top of it. When you’re down there, you’ve got to be able to finish.”

Gateway was leading 14-7 and headed for another first-quarter score when McKeesport’s defense forced a fumble from Birch inside the 5.

McKeesport recovered, and its offense marched 97 yards in 13 plays. The long drive ate more than seven minutes off the clock and forced a 14-14 tie early in the second quarter.

From then on, McKeesport used its strength.

“Our plan was to run the ball with Anthony Boyd,” Spell said. “We had a couple of new packages put in that we were going to run … but they couldn’t out-power us, so we kept going.”

Along with the 13-play drive, McKeesport later had a 12-play touchdown drive. Spell carried six times on one drive and seven on the other.

He left twice during the game with cramps, but returned each time.

“He’s been playing tight end all year and we moved him a couple of weeks ago just basically for short yardage,” Miller said. “Watching him perform, what an athlete.”

Gateway had held an early 14-0 lead thanks to its defense, which scored the night’s first points. Shawn Moorefield returned a fumbled 36 yards for a touchdown, and running back Jaquon Reynolds followed with a 1-yard touchdown run on the next possession.

Reynolds was held to 14 yards on 12 carries but scored twice.

Gateway almost had another defensive touchdown in the first quarter, but officials had whistled the play over before the fumble.

“We could’ve been up 21-7, but there was an inadvertent whistle,” Holl said. “Instead, they had that long drive with (Spell) at fullback.”

Trailing 14-0, McKeesport’s rally got a boost from a 92-yard kickoff return touchdown by Kemon Spell. The Tigers followed that score with the 97-yard drive, ending with a 15-yard touchdown run by Kemon Spell.

The younger Spell is a talented 14-year-old with college offers from Pitt, Wisconsin and UNLV.

On the first possession after halftime, his brother Keith Spell extended McKeesport’s lead to 24-14 with a 79-yard touchdown run and a stiff-arm around the 10.

Birch answered with a 4-yard touchdown pass to Lewis, but McKeesport scored again on a 9-yard run by Boyd for a 31-20 lead.

A 3-yard touchdown run by Reynolds cut McKeesport’s lead to 31-28 midway through the third, but Gateway got no closer. Keith Spell opened the fourth quarter with a 1-yard touchdown run, pushing McKeesport’s lead to 38-28.

Gateway had two fourth-quarter possessions inside McKeesport’s 5-yard line, but the first ended with an incomplete pass and the second was cut short by a fumble. In one stretch, Gateway was stopped on three consecutive plays from the 1.

“We know we’re more powerful than those guys,” said Keith Spell, who also plays defensive end. “We had to step up, and that’s what we did. We got a stop.”

Chris Harlan is a TribLive reporter covering sports. He joined the Trib in 2009 after seven years as a reporter at the Beaver County Times. He can be reached at charlan@triblive.com.

Tags: Gateway, McKeesport