Alle-Kiski high school notebook: Mowry takes over Knoch football

By: HSSN Staff
Saturday, January 19, 2019 | 9:18 PM

Needing to fulfill a graduation requirement of 2,000 volunteer hours while attending college at Slippery Rock, Brandon Mowry called his former high school football coach Mike King and joined his staff at Knoch as an assistant.

And so began a 15-year process that culminated Wednesday with Mowry becoming the eighth coach in Knoch football history.

“Going there with Mike and having him as your head coach, I can remember what it’s like being in that position, and now it’s a role reversal,” said Mowry, a 2002 Knoch graduate who played offensive and defensive line for the Knights. “To just look and see the growth over the past 20 years is just tremendous. You don’t get there over that path without people helping you along.”

Mowry, 34, held various coaching positions the last 15 seasons at his alma mater, leading the offensive line the past two. He takes over as coach for Frank Whalen, who resigned for work-related reasons.

“You learn a lot from those guys,” Mowry said. “Mike was very organized, showed how to run a program from top to bottom. I’ve taken pieces from that over the years. Mike was a fiery, passionate guy and kind of lit that fire under me as a kid, and that carried over. With Frank, I did a lot of breakdown work for him for scouting, and Frank helped me learn some of the more fine details of the game. These past couple years, he really gave me the reins of the O-line and a lot of things with the running of the program. He peeled the curtain back there.”

Under Mowry’s tutelage in 2018, junior guard Cole Lassinger was named first-team all-conference in the Class 4A Northwest Eight and senior center Jarrett Bricker was named to the second team. The line paved the way for running back Matt Goodlin to break the Knoch regular-season rushing record with 1,441 yards.

Mowry was an assistant in 2011, when Knoch reached the WPIAL Class AAA championship game at Heinz Field.

The Knights will go into the 2019 season seeking their first WPIAL playoff berth since 2014. They finished 5-5 last season and 3-4 in conference play, missing out on the postseason because of tiebreakers, but return standout players like juniors Goodlin, Lassinger, Jim Johnston and Scott Fraser.

“Well have a team meeting in the next few days and lay some groundwork out for them,” Mowry said. “We want to get them excited and show them where we want to be. It’s going to take hard work to get there, but it’s something I definitely think we can achieve.”

San Francisco treat

It didn’t take long for Joe Woods to land his newest NFL coaching job.

The Kiski Area graduate, the Denver Broncos’ defensive coordinator the past two seasons, was hired Thursday as the San Francisco 49ers defensive backs coach and passing game coordinator.

Under Woods, the Broncos finished fifth in the NFL in 2018 in Football Outsiders’ Defense-adjusted Value Over Average, a ranking system that takes strength of opponents and other factors into account.

The 48-year-old Woods, a 1988 Kiski Area graduate, is a 26-year-old coaching veteran, mainly as defensive backs coach. His first NFL experience came as the Tampa Bay Buccaneers’ defensive backs coach from 2004-05, and he also coached the DBs for the Minnesota Vikings (2006-13), Oakland Raiders (2014) and Broncos (2015-16) before becoming the Broncos’ coordinator in 2017. His college college coaching stops include Muskingum, Eastern Michigan, Northwestern State, Grand Valley State, Kent State, Hofstra and Western Michigan.

Woods, who won a Super Bowl 50 ring with the Broncos after the 2015 season, wasn’t retained when the team fired head coach Vance Joseph after the 2018 season.

Bevy of Cavaliers

Jack and Ryne might be shadow recruits, but so are Drew and Andrew.

A quartet of Kiski Area football players — seniors Jack Colecchi, Ryne Wallace, Drew Dinunzio-Biss and Andrew Mason — are gaining some traction on the recruiting trail. Mason committed to Grove City, and Colecchi, Dinunzio-Biss and Wallace picked up their first scholarship offers from Division II programs.

Colecchi, who broke Joey Brungo’s school record for career receiving yards, got an offer from Cal (Pa.). A 6-foot-2 WR/DB, Colecchi caught 40 passes for 692 yards and five touchdowns as a senior, earning all-conference honors, and also intercepted two passes.

Dinunzio-Biss, who picked up offers from Clarion and IUP, finished his Kiski Area career as the program’s all-time leading solo tackler with 270, including 89 as a senior. He also had six sacks from his middle linebacker position despite missing two games with injury and added 383 rushing yards and five touchdowns.

Wallace, offered by West Virginia Wesleyan, had a career year as the Cavaliers’ quarterback. The 6-5 left-hander threw for a career-high 1,851 yards and 16 touchdowns as a senior despite sitting out one game.

Mason, a WR/CB, was limited to four games as a senior. In his limited action, he made three tackles and caught one touchdown pass: a 56-yard score in the Cavaliers’ WPIAL first-round playoff loss to Gateway.

Fleet Foxes

Fox Chapel track and field competitors had a record-breaking meet in the second competition of the indoor season.

Competing at the Tri-State Track Coaches Association meet at Edinboro, the Foxes set six school records.

Senior sprinter Kate Carnevale, a Davidson recruit, established marks in the 60- and 200-meter dashes, finishing with times of 8.2 and 27.41 seconds, respectively. She finished fourth in the 60 and fifth in the 200.

The 3,200 relay team of Brooke Krally, Grace Sisson, Sareena Seeger and Annika Urban set a school record and took first overall at the meet after a time of 10:17.81 seconds. Sisson also set the individual school record in the 3,000 run in 10:48.91.

Other records included Zoey Zoschg with a high jump of 4 feet, 2 inches and Eras Yager in the shot put with a toss of 32-11.

Doug Gulasy is a Tribune-Review staff writer. You can contact Doug at dgulasy@tribweb.com or via Twitter @dgulasy_Trib.

Tags: Fox Chapel, Kiski School, Knoch