Aliquippa drops PIAA appeal, accepts promotion to Class 4A football

By: Chris Harlan
Wednesday, January 22, 2020 | 2:55 PM

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MECHANICSBURG — Aliquippa accepted its football team’s fate Wednesday and the school ended efforts to stay in Class 3A.

School administrators were scheduled to appear before the PIAA board and argue their appeal, but instead they cancelled that hearing on the advice of Aliquippa’s school board, said athletic director Brandon LeDonne. The Quips already had their request denied once this month by the PIAA and they didn’t believe this last-gasp appeal would turn out any differently.

“We felt like we had some very valid points, very reasonable arguments, but it didn’t seem the PIAA was willing to even look at that stuff,” LeDonne said. “On those grounds, (the school board) made the decision to leave it alone.”

A PIAA competitive-balance rule will force Aliquippa to play football in Class 4A next season against schools three times its size. The Quips have a Class A enrollment but voluntarily “played up” the past four seasons in Class 3A.

The new rule measures postseason success and transfers over a two-year period. Teams with six “success points” and three or more transfers are required to move up one classification from the previous season.

The rule makes no exception for teams already playing up voluntarily. Making a school with 117 boys face opponents with more than 300 has LeDonne concerned for player safety.

“We’re going to play probably 13 to 14 kids,” LeDonne said. “Our kids will play both ways and special teams, against teams that are probably going to play 40 kids. … I don’t know if they’re taking player safety into consideration there.”

What’s more concerning is that Aliquippa might have trouble escaping Class 4A after the 2021 season. If the Quips football team adds three transfers or more in the next two years, they’ll stay in Class 4A for the 2022 and ’23 seasons as well.

That’s even if the team goes winless.

“We as a district need to have some conversations about how we handle that,” said LeDonne, who envisioned a time when a school might tell new students that they can’t play football. “I find it hard to believe there are many schools that don’t have three transfers.”

Eight schools in all were targeted for promotion: Aliquippa, Archbishop Wood, Cathedral Prep, Farrell, Imhotep Charter, Lackawanna Trail, Southern Columbia and Wilmington.

The PIAA heard appeals Wednesday from four schools and granted relief to Southern Columbia and Wilmington, allowing both to remain in Class 2A. However, the PIAA rejected requests from Farrell and Archbishop Wood. The others didn’t appeal.

Wilmington argued that according to the rule, transfers should’ve been counted only from the past two school years, but the PIAA also had included 2017-18. The board agreed, and lowered Wilmington and Southern Columbia’s transfer count to below the threshold.

However, Farrell (moving up to Class 2A) and Archbishop Wood (6A) still had too many.

“We accept the decision,” LeDonne said, “but we still don’t believe it’s fair or equitable.”

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.

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