Football
Scholastic Notebook – 06/05/2015
June 5, 2015
Four WPIAL baseball teams have made it to the PIAA semifinals. The main ingredient to their postseason success is simple. Pitching. Of course, pitching always is key in baseball, but you might be scratching your head to come up with a group of WPIAL teams that made it this far and that have such a strong common thread of stellar pitching between them. The four are Shaler (Class AAAA), Knoch (AAA), Neshannock (AA) and Quaker Valley (AA). Of the four, only Neshannock has really made a huge impact offensively, scoring 45 runs in six postseason games. But the pitching of all four teams has been impeccable.
2015 Positive Athlete Awards
May 19, 2015
2015 Positive Athlete Awards On Wednesday, May 13th, 27 Western PA High School students were recognized at the John Heinz History Center by Hines Ward as “Positive Athletes” . These athletes were nominated by coaches, teachers, administrators, parents, and friends for their ability to meet the following criteria in their day-to day lives as athletes, students and members of their communities.Scholastic Notebook – 05/15/2015
May 15, 2015
The name is Aaron, as in Hank. The hitting this baseball season has been Hank Aaron-esque. California senior Aaron Previsky had a regular season for the ages. A year ago, Norwin’s J.J. Matijevic became the first known player to win the WPIAL triple crown (first in batting average, home runs and RBIs). Previsky didn’t do that, but his regular season also was terrific. Previsky finished with a .545 batting average, which was good for 13th in the WPIAL. But he was second in home runs with six and third in runs scored with 35.Scholastic Notebook – 04/25/2015
April 25, 2015
It opened some eyes in October when Bailey Parshall accepted a scholarship from the Penn State softball team. Parshall is a freshman and when she accepted the scholarship, she had yet to pitch an inning in high school. But after a month of the WPIAL softball season, it has become clear why Penn State went after Parshall. Parshall already has established herself as one of the WPIAL’s top pitchers – as a ninth-grader. In the latest WPIAL statistics published by the Post-Gazette, Parshall leads the WPIAL in strikeouts with 115 and she is tied for the WPIAL lead in wins. She has a 10-1 record. Chartiers-Houston’s Kaitlyn Dittrich also is 10-1.Scholastic Notebook – 04/17/2015
April 17, 2015
Life in Section 1 of WPIAL Class AAAA baseball is full of close calls. The WPIAL season is a little less than a month old and it’s remarkable how many close games there are in Section 1. Heading into Friday’s action, there have been 12 games played in the section. Two-thirds were decided by two runs or less and five had been decided by one run. The close games certainly reflect the balance of the section. But they also reflect the strength of the section. This should tell you the strength of Section 1: It includes four teams – Moon, North Allegheny, Pine-Richland and Seneca Valley – that have made 17 WPIAL championship appearances in either Class AAAA or AAA over the past 11 years. The other members of the section are North Hills and Butler.Lamenza Named to Lead Blackhawk Football Program
The Blackhawk Cougars have settled on the coach that will follow Joe Hamilton. Current Mohawk head coach Joe Lamenza, was tabbed to lead the Cougars on Thursday night. Lamenza was 7-29 in four years at Mohawk, he has also served as the head coach at West Mifflin and Slippery Rock and was an assistant at Ellwood City, Riverside and Beaver, along with Robert Morris University. The new coach knows something about competition, Mohawk has played in the Midwestern Conference under Lamenza, he goes now to the Parkway Conference, where Blackhawk has struggled the past few seasons. The Cougars have not won a playoff game since 2008, a winning record since 2011 and missed the playoffs in both 2013 and 2014.Scholastic Notebook – 04/10/2015
April 10, 2015
Beaver Falls High School is trying to make sure the school’s 1975 baseball team won’t be forgotten. At a baseball game in two weeks, the ’75 team that won a WPIAL title will be honored before a Beaver Falls game. No one is quite ready to call this year’s Beaver Falls team championship caliber, but the Tigers are doing a pretty good job of grabbing some attention for themselves. It’s still extremely early in the WPIAL baseball season, but Beaver Falls is 3-0. That might not sound like much, but considering the past few years, it is a gigantic step forward for Beaver Falls.
