WPIAL Saturday’s Scholastic Starz – Week Four

By: Bruce Markey
Sunday, September 27, 2015 | 12:18 PM

Saturday was a perfect afternoon/evening for high school football, perfectly timed for two schools in particular as Shady Side Academy and Beaver High School celebrated picture perfect homecoming weekends and the tradition of playing on a Saturday instead of Friday night. here are the Top Four performances from the Fourth Friday of the 2015 season from a pair of AA Allegheny Conference afternoon games and two conference contests played under the lights.

Darius Wise – Beaver

There are some folks out there that thought Beaver was in trouble on Saturday, facing undefeated New Brighton while coming off a stinging 40-point loss to Beaver Falls the previous week. However picking against the maroon and grey would have been Un-Wise. Darius Wise delighted past and present Beaver fans by rushing for 269 yards on 18 carries and scoring three touchdowns on runs of 35, 43 and 53 yards as the Bobcats bounced back with a 28-14 Class AA Midwestern Athletic Conference victory over the visiting Lions.

Hunter Burns – Deer Lakes

There are workhorses on the gridiron, then there is the Deer Lakes running back who has a tendancy to ‘scorch’ the opposition. Deer Lakes ran 43 plays from the line of scrimmage and Hunter Burns carried the ball on 33 of those plays, rushing for 295 yards and scoring four touchdowns on runs of 1, 2, 65 and 63 yards, the last two coming in the fourth quarter to put away the host Shady Side Academy Indians 28-9 in a Class AA Allegheny Conference game that improved the Lancers to 4-0 for the first time in school history.   

Philip Petit – Valley

Valley is a player again in the Class AA Allegheny Conference as they improved to 3-1 by scoring early and often on the road against winless Summit Academy. Quarterback Philip Petit only completed six passes, but threw for 185 yards and two touchdowns when he hooked up with D’Aundre Johnson for an 88-yard scoring bomb in the second quarter after throwing a first quarter six yard TD to Tyson Hill. Petit also ran for two scores of 11 and 1-yard as the Vikings blew past the Knights 35-8.

Devon Brown – Fort Cherry

Everybody is looking up at Class A heavyweights Avonworth and Cardinal Wuerl North Catholic in the Black Hills Conference, but two teams in the middle of the pack met at Dormont Stadium Saturday night. Proving that its how you finish that matters, Fort Cherry quarterback Devon Brown struggled for most of the night , hitting on only 9 of 28 passes for 171 yards. But trailing 14-7 in the fourth quarter, Brown hit Scott Miller on a 62-yard game tying scoring strike, then scored on a 1-yard run in overtime to give the Rangers a 20-14 win over the Bishop Canevin Crusaders.

Tags: Beaver, Deer Lakes, Fort Cherry, Valley