Trib HSSN’s top stories from the 2024-25 school year

By: Chris Harlan
Saturday, June 28, 2025 | 4:35 PM

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Top high school sports stories from 2024-25

Sept. 18, 2024

Girls flag football officially becomes a PIAA-sanctioned sport. With more than 100 school-sponsored teams statewide, the PIAA board votes to add the sport in the 2025-26 school year.

Sept. 27, 2024

Hopewell’s Rocco Marcantonio ties a WPIAL record with a 55-yard field goal. Only one other player in WPIAL history is known to have converted a kick from that distance.

Oct. 1, 2024

Eight months before Oakmont hosted the U.S. Open, Peters Township’s Colton Lusk tames the historic golf course with seven birdies. The senior shoots a 4-under 67 to win the WPIAL 3A boys title.

Nov. 8, 2024

An iconic streak ends when the Aliquippa football team loses to Thomas Jefferson, 38-21, in a WPIAL 4A semifinal. The Quips, who’d reached the finals every year since 2008, were trying to make their 17th straight appearance.

Nov. 16, 2024

Thomas Jefferson’s Bill Cherpak becomes the first football coach to win 10 WPIAL titles when the Jaguars defeat McKeesport in the Class 4A final at Norwin. Later in the school year, longtime Riverside coach Dan Oliastro becomes the first to win seven WPIAL baseball titles.

Nov. 16, 2025

The North Allegheny girls volleyball team wins its eighth straight state championship, tying the longest streak of consecutive PIAA titles in any sport. The Tigers defeat Spring-Ford, 3-1, in the PIAA 4A final. Only Norwin girls volleyball (1976-83) and Villa Maria Academy girls swimming (2011-18) also won eight PIAA titles in a row

Dec. 6-7, 2024

No WPIAL football teams win a state title for only the second time since the PIAA playoffs started in 1988. Adding to the WPIAL’s woes, no soccer teams win states either.

Dec. 12, 2024

Longtime Rochester football coach Gene Matsook announces he’s stepping down after 39 years with the program. In 25 years as head coach, he led the Rams to 221 wins, four WPIAL titles and two state championships.

Feb. 27, 2025

Weeks after he shared plans to retire, the Belle Vernon boys basketball team sends coach Joe Salvino out on top by winning the WPIAL 5A title. The WPIAL title was the team’s first since 1978. For Salvino, the title was his seventh overall but first since becoming Belle Vernon’s coach in 2018. He retired as the second-winningest coach in WPIAL boys basketball history.

Feb. 10, 2025

Elite Clairton scorer Iyanna Wade becomes the fourth girls basketball player in WPIAL history to reach 3,000 career points. The senior guard finishes with 3,120, second most in WPIAL history. Four boys join the 2,000-point list: Avonworth’s Rowan Carmichael, Chartiers Valley’s Jayden Davis, Belle Vernon’s Zion Moore and Neighborhood Academy’s Courtney Wallace.

Feb. 4, 2025

The Highlands boys basketball team qualifies for the WPIAL playoffs, moving past early season hazing allegations that left the Golden Rams shorthanded and without their coach.

Feb. 20, 2025

The PIAA changes its transgender athlete policy to comply with a Trump Administration directive — now classifying students by “sex” rather than “gender.” The effort draws criticism from all sides.

March 7, 2025

A fight in the bleachers spills onto the court leading officials to cut short a PIAA boys basketball playoff game between Uniontown and Meadville. An Imani Christian vs. Aliquippa game was similarly halted two months earlier, also after fans ran onto the court. A girls playoff game between St. Joseph and Farrell finishes in an empty gym.

March 8, 2025

Belle Vernon’s Elijah Brown wins his school’s first state wrestling title, doing so in a weight class dominated this year by WPIAL athletes. All four semifinalists in the 215-pound bracket for Class 3A hailed from WPIAL schools.

March 13, 2025

Mt. Pleasant’s Lily King becomes the first swimmer in a career to win eight individual gold medals at both the WPIAL and PIAA championships. As a senior, the N.C. State recruit swept the 100- and 200-yard freestyle for Class 2A girls.

March 29, 2025

The South Fayette girls basketball team completed its “revenge tour” by stunning Philadelphia Catholic League power Archbishop Wood, 45-37, in the PIAA 5A final. Wood had won a PIAA title four years in a row and nine times overall.

May 15, 2025

Laurel sprinter Tori Atkins finishes off her so-called “quadruple-double” by winning both the 200 and 400 meters in four consecutive years at the WPIAL 2A girls track championships. She is the first athlete to accomplish that feat.

May 28, 2025

Riverside’s Zach Hare pitches the first known perfect game in WPIAL baseball championship history, but his 1-0 win over Quaker Valley is part of something bigger. In all, Hare pitches 34 consecutive no-hit innings in the playoffs, helping the Panthers win WPIAL and PIAA Class 3A titles.

May 29, 2025

The Shaler softball team completes the Titans’ trifecta by winning the WPIAL Class 5A title in 11 innings. In the span of three days, Shaler celebrates WPIAL titles in baseball, softball and boys volleyball.

June 9-10, 2025

It takes 17 innings — and two days — but Indiana wins the longest baseball game in PIAA playoff history. A walk-off walk lets the Indians defeat East Pennsboro, 6-5, in a Class 4A semifinal. Indiana won WPIAL and PIAA titles, and four of its seven postseason wins needed extra innings.

June 12, 2025

The Neshannock softball dynasty rolls on with a second straight undefeated season and another state title, this time over South Williamsport in the PIAA 2A final. The Lancers, behind pitcher Addy Frye, went 100-1 in four seasons with four WPIAL championships and three PIAA titles.

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.