Antonio Perkins leads Burrell past his former teammates at Valley

By: Josh Rizzo
Friday, October 3, 2025 | 10:39 PM

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Burrell quarterback Antonio Perkins doesn’t expect hard feelings the next time he gets together with his friends at Valley. Perkins, who was a standout wrestler and football player for the Vikings last season, transferred to Burrell in the offseason.

He piled up 303 rushing yards and scored four times to help the Buccaneers during a 41-21 Allegheny 7 Conference home win Friday night. This was Burrell’s seventh consecutive win over the Vikings, who have lost 22 consecutive games.

“It was crazy,” Perkins said. “It felt a little weird. It’s all love at the end of the day. I still hang out with some of these kids outside of football.”

Burrell coach Dom Girardi said he didn’t notice much difference from Perkins during the lead-up to the game this week.

“Tone’s a special kid,” Girardi said. “He’s mentally strong and mature for his age. I’m sure it was difficult and added motivation. He handled himself well all week, and he handled himself well tonight.”

Burrell (3-4, 2-1) overcame a high number of penalties to move the ball methodically down the field. The Buccaneers finished with 462 rushing yards and took advantage of a banged-up Valley defensive line.

“We had guys out who would have helped us,” Adams said. “The one thing we weren’t able to do is stop them. They had long drives, which is hard because it wears you down and runs down the clock.”

Trey Coury, who finished with 159 rushing yards, opened the scoring with an 8-yard touchdown run. Burrell’s momentum didn’t last long.

Radyn Thomas answered Coury’s touchdown with an 84-yard kick return for a score. Coury put Burrell back ahead with another 1-yard touchdown run.

Brendon Knuckles gave Valley another jolt when he threw a 35-yard touchdown pass to Sean Wilkerson to tie the score in the second quarter. Wilkerson scored two touchdowns, also catching a 15-yard touchdown from Knuckles in the fourth quarter.

Burrell’s rushing game was slowed down by a bevy of holding penalties. The Buccaneers had north of 110 yards in penalty yardage.

Girardi said it was hard to keep track of the infractions.

“I don’t even know what they are,” Girardi said. “Whenever you have a penalty-filled game. It gives you a weird sense. You normally get a feel for a game, you get a lot of flags, it gets you out of rhythm.”

Perkins gave Burrell the lead for good, 21-14, when he scored on a 15-yard run with 1 minute, 18 seconds left in the first half. Perkins had two more scoring runs in the third quarter to help Burrell pull away.

“We had to focus,” Perkins said. “We had to come together and stop shooting ourselves in the foot.”

Tags: Burrell, Valley