Westmoreland County boys soccer notebook: Latrobe still fine-tuning game

By: Bill Beckner Jr.
Wednesday, September 18, 2024 | 11:01 AM

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Latrobe coach Jake Rice will take a win any way he can get it, but he thinks his team is capable of more.

“Sometimes, you just have to win dirty,” Rice said.

By that, the third-year coach was referring to the Wildcats winning despite not playing their best.

Their best might be yet to come.

“We have been off a little bit lately,” Rice said. “Like I’ve said all season, we go as the Agostonis (Roman and Warren) go. Our back line has been playing well, but I know we can be better (offensively).”

Latrobe (5-2, 5-1), which is leading Section 3-3A, held off Penn-Trafford, 1-0, then edged past No. 2 Franklin Regional, 2-1.

The Wildcats were cooled off by Allderdice on Tuesday in a 3-0 loss.

Roman Agostoni scored all three goals in the wins, including a highlight-reel score late in the second half against Franklin Regional.

Rice said Latrobe’s best game, “by far,” was a 5-0 shutout of 3A newcomer Belle Vernon.

The Wildcats never have won a section title or a playoff game, so the motivation is wired into the grid.

“We want to keep it going,” Roman Agostoni said.

In the hunt

Ligonier Valley wants to make the WPIAL Class 2A playoffs. That much was clear after an impressive win last week.

The Rams (5-4, 2-4) went to two overtimes against McGuffey and pulled out a 3-2 victory for their fourth win in five games.

Michael Vargulish Graver connected on the winner with two minutes to play. The score followed a clutch save by Andrew Donaldson.

Devan Grando also had a goal, and Hunter Wright tied it 2-2 on a penalty kick.

Ligonier Valley was tied with Steel Valley for fifth place. The top four teams in each section make the playoffs.

Scotties contending

By winning three of its first four section games, Southmoreland (6-2, 4-2) moved into third place in Section 4-2A behind Mt. Pleasant and Charleroi.

Jack Smith had two goals to pace the team to a 4-0 win over Brownsville.

Man down

Mt. Pleasant had to grind out a double-overtime victory against Southmoreland on Tuesday in a match it likes to call the “819 Derby.”

It was more like the 11-on-10 Derby.

Mt. Pleasant’s Aidan Johnson received a red card about 20 minutes in, so Mt. Pleasant had to play the remainder of the game a man down. Because it went two overtimes, the Vikings only had 10 players for about 80 minutes of soccer.

Still, they pulled out the win.

Mt. Pleasant led 2-0 before two scores from the upstart Scotties.

Jarret Garn connected with 44 seconds left to lift Mt. Pleasant (7-2, 6-0) to the victory. Aydan Gross had two assists, and Bryson Bankosh and Gavin Rummel also scored for the Vikings.

Top games

The local game to watch Thursday looks to be in Section 1-4A. Norwin (6-3, 4-0) will visit No. 3 Plum (7-0-2, 4-0) in a first-place matchup of regular playoff contenders. Plum moved up from Class 3A this season.

Norwin won the WPIAL title last year, whereas Plum reached the 3A quarterfinals as a No. 1 seed, made the semis in 2022 as a No. 2 seed and in 2021 as a No. 4 seed.

Another intriguing matchup Thursday is in Section 3-3A where upstart Allderdice (5-1-1, 3-0-1) visits Franklin Regional (4-2, 3-1), and Belle Vernon (3-4, 1-3) heads to Penn-Trafford (3-3-1, 2-2-1).

In Class 2A, Mt. Pleasant (7-2, 6-0) hosts Charleroi (7-0, 6-0) for first place in Section 4. Charleroi has outscored opponents 51-7.

Movin’ on up

After a solid week, Latrobe went from unranked to the No. 2 spot in the TribLive HSSN Class 3A rankings.

Franklin Regional dropped a spot to No. 3.

Thomas Jefferson holds the top spot, Hampton is No. 4 and Moon is No. 5.

Bill Beckner Jr. is a TribLive reporter covering local sports in Westmoreland County. He can be reached at bbeckner@triblive.com.