Big Game Hunting: The Football ‘Three’pack for Week 16

By: Bruce Markey
Wednesday, December 15, 2010 | 12:00 AM

With apologies to Dorothy from "The Wizard of Oz" we here at Big Game Hunting are fairly sure that somewhere over a southwestern Pennsylvania rainbow right now, Tim O'Malley is chanting "Lions and Tigers and Bears, oh yeah!" District-seven will have three participants in the state high school football championships coming up this weekend in Hershey Pennsylvania. The WPIAL all-time record in PIAA championship games is 30-35. Pittsburgh Central Catholic, Rochester and Thomas Jefferson have all won three "Golden Footballs", but none of those teams will be in Hershey this weekend. Clairton and North Allegheny look for their second title and South Fayette will try for a first ever, and they will all be part of "Big-Game Hunting".

AAAA PIAA Championship Game:
North Allegheny Tigers (14-1) vs LaSalle College Explorers (13-1) AT Hersheypark Stadium in Hershey on Saturday, December 18th at 5:00pm broadcast on msasports.net and the NASN by Randy Gore and Rick Meister

To win this AAAA state championship for district-seven Art Walker's football team must be like the scarecrow and use their brains and continue to do what has made them a finalist for a golden football, run the ball and play great defense. North Allegheny's offensive line will be the deciding factor in this game, as they have been really throughout the entire post season for the Tigers. They will face the defending PIAA AAAA champions in LaSalle College, LaSalle in November won their third straight Philadelphia Catholic League championship.

The Explorers are led by a junior quarterback in Matt Magarity and a senior running back in Jamal Abdur-Rahman. LaSalle enters this championship game coming off a thrilling semi-final victory over North Penn 38-35, in what a lot of people from the eastern side of the state called the greatest high school football game they have ever seen. Magarity in that win, completed 10 of 19 passes for 180 yards and a pair of touchdowns, while Abdur-Rahman rushed for 142 yards and three touchdowns on 21 carries in the win. Defensive lineman Ryan Geiger clinched the win for the Explorers with an interception off a deflection late in the fourth quarter.

The Tigers of North Allegheny just keep pounding every opponent they play into submission despite not having their star running back Alex Papson. Last week in the state semis the Tigers rolled to a convincing victory over Cumberland Valley 35-17 behind a great defense and a powerful rushing attack. Matt Steinbeck and Alex DeCiantis combined to carry the ball 38 times for 258 yards, DeCiantis scored three touchdowns and Steinbeck threw for one as well in the win.

But make no mistake the difference makers this post season for North Allegheny are the guys up front in the trenches on both sides of the football. The Tigers are led up front by the Kugler brothers, Rob (senior 6'4" 245 pounds) and Pat (sophomore 6'4" 270 pounds) along with Justin Haser (senior 6'5" 245 pounds) and Vince Czerniewski (6'1" 280 pounds), their size and athleticism has allowed the Tigers to dominate on both sides of the football.

Senior quarterback Mike Buchert has played very solidly behind that offensive line and looks for opportunities to find his big play wide receiver Dan Slivka whenever the chance arises.

AA PIAA Championship Game:
South Fayette Lions (15-0) vs Philadelphia West Catholic Burrs (12-2) AT Hersheypark Stadium in Hershey on Saturday, December 18th at 12:00pm on msasports.net and WJPA FM 95.3 by Bob Gregg and Mark Uriah

To win this AA state championship for district-seven Joe Rossi's team must be like the Lion they are named after and use their courage to throw the football, no matter the weather conditions. The Lions reached this point in large part because of the right arm of Christian Brumbaugh, don't let possible bad weather deter you from what you have done all season long.

There will be a lot of offensive firepower in the PIAA championship game. West Catholic has won five straight Philadelphia Catholic League AA titles and three straight District – 12 titles. The Burrs are 0-1 in state championship games falling to Wilmington 35-34 in 2008. The Burrs are the top offensive and defensive stats team in the entire Philadelphia Catholic in 2010. They average scoring 35.6 points per game including piling up an average of nearly 370 total yards of offense per game on the season.

They are a dominant rushing team with three players over 700 yards rushing on the year, leading the way is senior running back Brandon Hollomon who has rushed for 1444 yards and 17 touchdowns on 127 attempts on the year, that is an average of nearly 11.5 yards per carry.

Don't get too focused on the run though if you are the South Fayette Lions because senior quarterback Anthony Reid can hurt you with his arm, Reid, 6'1" 185 pounds, has completed 85 of 148 passes on the year for 1307 yards and 13 touchdowns, he has only thrown three interceptions.

Meanwhile South Fayette's offense, led by record-breaking quarterback Christian Brumbaugh has been blowing other teams out of the water all season long, out scoring opponents by an average margin of 42.1-15.7 on the year.
In the semifinals win over Forest Hills, 49-12, Brumbaugh continued to do things that no other Pennsylvania prep quarterback has ever done. For example; when he passed for 362 yards in the win, Brumbaugh became the all-time WPIAL record-holder for career passing yardage with 7,052. It also gave him the WPIAL record for passing yards in a season with 3,615. He also threw six touchdown passes in the win and that is a PIAA record high. Those six touchdown passes gave him 50 for the season and, yes, you guessed it, that is the Pennsylvania state record.

The Lions have loads of weapons for Brumbaugh including the Challingsworth brothers, Tyler and Zach, as well as Josh Patterson, and a pair of great tight ends in Tanner Courtad, and Eric Myers. They also have a tremendous athlete in the backfield to run or catch passes in senior Jeff Davis. Davis rushed for 147 yards in the state semis including a 50 yard touchdown scamper.

A PIAA Championship Game:
Clairton Bears (15-0) vs Taylor Riverside Vikings (14-1) AT Hersheypark Stadium in Hershey on Friday, December 17th at 2:00pm on msasports.net by Steve Young and Mark Hoover

To win this A state championship game for district-seven Tom Nola's team must be like the tin man and find the heart for one more amazing defensive performance.

Taylor Riverside will be a good challenge for the top defensive football team in the state of Pennsylvania. The Vikings have a pair of thousand yard rushers for the season including quarterback Corey Talerico (senior 5"11" 180 pounds), Talerico has rushed 138 times for 1,068 yards and 16 touchdowns on the year, he has also contributed big time through the air for the Vikes. On the season Talerico has completed 124 of 129 passes for 1,771 yards and 27 touchdowns to go along with nine interceptions.

The leading rusher for the Vikings is senior Nick Rossi, a beast at 6'1" 234 pounds, Rossi has pounded out 1,139 yards on the ground and totaled 22 touchdowns in his 156 carries on the year. Rossi is also a monster on defense for the Vikings with 143 total tackles on the year. The Vikings leading receiver on the season is also a senior, Skylar Lavage has caught 51 passes for 881 yards and a dozen touchdowns on the year, Lavage is also a big time defensive contributor for Riverside with over a hundred tackles on the year.

In 1997 Riverside made their only other appearance in the PIAA championship game falling to Sharpsville 10-7.

Clairton meanwhile is looking their second title to go with last years first ever "gold football victory" over Bishop-McCort 15-3. The Bears overall are 1-1 in state championship football games falling to Steelton Highspire in 2008.

The Bear defense has just been "the best", there is no other way to describe it, last week in the state semifinals the Bears crushed Farrell 48-8 at North Allegheny high school…and that was the most points the Bears have allowed in a football game all season long. The Clairton defense is allowing less than 2.3 points per game on the year.

That defense got a big boost last week when Marquis Norris (senior 6'5" 325 pounds), was cleared to play on both side of the ball with a knee injury. Norris along with Brandon Small, Carvan Thompson, Desimon Green, Bishop Neal and Devante Gardlock are the main pillars of that defense.

Offensively, and on special teams the Bears are just loaded with spectacular playmakers. Josh Page (leading receiver) and Tyler Boyd both returned punts for touchdowns last week in the win over the Steelers. Desi Green has been struggling with some injury issues as well here late in the season for the Bears, but Green was able to go last week and he is a triple threat for Clairton, at quarterback he can kill you with his arm and his legs, he has thrown for 1,729 yards and rushed for nearly another 700 on the year. He has been a part of a combined 41 touchdowns on the season. Tyler Boyd and Karvonn Coles will kill you running the football, Page is a tremendous deep threat as well.