Looking back at Week 2 of the high school football season.
Beaver's 28-14 victory against Aliquippa Friday was dripping with historical significance.
It has been well-documented that Beaver's win broke Aliquippa's 62-game regular-season winning streak, the longest in WPIAL history. The last time Aliquippa lost a regular-season game was to Beaver Falls in 2009.
What made Beaver's performance even more impressive was that it came AT Aliquippa's Carl A. Aschman Stadium: It was the first time Beaver won at Aliquippa since Harding High School changed its name to Aliquippa in 1930. So that means it was Beaver's first win at Aliquippa in close to 100 years?
Beaver has defeated Aliquippa four times since 1997 (in 1997, 2005, 2007 and 2008). But all of those wins came on Beaver's home field. Yes, Beaver played Aliquippa at home in back-to-back years of 2007 and 2008. The two teams have played every year since 1996, but they didn't play from 1982-95.
One other interesting thing about Beaver's win. Where does it put the Bobcats in the WPIAL rankings? Beaver was the Post-Gazette's No. 4 WPIAL Class 3A team. The Post-Gazette's new rankings are released tomorrow after on www.post-gazette.com
Sto-Rox full of Doubt
Brady Doubt became Sto-Rox's starting quarterback only this season. In his third start, he had a game for the ages.
Against Shenango Friday, Doubt completed 21 of 29 passes for 418 yards, which ties for the ninth-best single-game passing yardage total in WPIAL history. Doubt tied Seton-LaSalle's Bruce Gradkowski, who threw for 418 yards against Beth-Center in 2000.
And oh, check out Bruce when he had all that hair as a teenager at Seton-LaSalle. Gradkowski is pictured during his Seton days.
Dudek surpasses 5,000
The Armstrong-McKeesport game Friday sounded like a classic. Armstrong won, 43-42, in overtime. In Brian Batko's Post-Gazette story, Armstrong super halfback Zane Dudek was called a "one-man wrecking machine" by McKeesport coach Matt Miller. So accurate, Matt. Dudek rushed for 301 yards on 45 carries and scored the game-winning two-point conversion.
But Dudek also became only the 17th runner in WPIAL history to reach 5,000 career yards rushing. He now has 5,071 on 503 carries.
Dudek is considering mostly Ivy League and Patriot League colleges. Doing that to a McKeesport offense, and considering other things Dudek has done, it makes you wonder if Dudek could play at a little higher level than Ivy or Patriot?
Here are Post-Gazette highlights from the Armstrong-McKeesport thriller, including Dudek's winning run and comments from Dudek and coach Frank Fabian:
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Other notes and thoughts
**** Hempfield is 3-0. That has me going back to the record books to see the last time that happened. Coach Rich Bowen said before the season how he was high on QB Justin Sliwoski. Turns out he had reason to be. Sliwoski was 23 of 40 for 328 yards in Friday's big victory against Mt. Lebanon.
**** It has been said that having six classifications will water down WPIAL football. Well, I'll tell you what is watered down: Class 2A after the top few teams. Trying to find five teams worthy of top five rankings every week is a little challenging in upcoming weeks.
**** Do you think there might be just a little interest in Friday's Pine-Richland at Penn Hills game? The way Pine's Phil Jurkovec and Penn Hills' Cam Tarrant are performing at quarterback, this one could be awfully fun to watch. Both have thrown for 1,000 yards already.
**** Is Norwin a sleeper team? The Knights gave Penn-Trafford all kinds of trouble in the season opener and have won two in a row since.
**** I've said it's a shame with the Class 2A playoff format that at least one pretty good team, if not two, in the Beaver Valley Conference won't make the postseason. I was talking about Aliquippa, Beaver, Beaver Falls and Central Valley. Well, maybe Quaker Valley has been overlooked. Impressive win against Neshannock Friday.
**** West Allegheny's D.J. Opsatnik kicked the 24th field goal of his career against North Hills. The WPIAL record is 35. No one has statistics that show the kickers with the 10 most field goals made in WPIAL history. But I would feel safe in saying Opsatnik would be in the top 10, possibly even the top five.
**** Beaver's victory against Aliquippa proved two things: No one is unbeatable, as many were saying about Aliquippa after thrashing Beaver Falls last week .... and Beaver QB Darius Wise is really good.
**** West Mifflin still has not allowed a touchdown, and the Titans seem to have another in a long line of talented halfbacks. Howard Reid ran for 239 Friday. What's in the water that West Mifflin RBs drink?
**** Besides Pine-Richland and Penn Hills, some other top matchups this week are Belle Vernon-Ringgold, Woodland Hills-Penn-Trafford, Rochester-Sto-Rox and Westinghouse-Brashear.
NA-Central video
Here are highlights from Friday's game of the week between North Allegheny and Central Catholic. It wasn't much of a game of the week.
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