By Pat Mitsch

Published: Thursday, May 10, 2012, 2:12 p.m.
Updated: Friday, May 11, 2012

The week after two Sewickley Academy tennis players squared off for the WPIAL singles title, two more Panthers won the WPIAL doubles championship.Juniors Patrick Dellinger and Will Kleeman claimed the WPIAL Class AA doubles crown, defeating Winchester-Thurston's Tym Hoban and Alex Kietz, 7-5, 6-2, at Shady Side Academy last Friday.Dellinger and Kleeman won the Academy its third straight WPIAL doubles title and brought it one step closer to sweeping the singles, doubles and team tennis championships this spring. The Panthers were the top seed in the Class AA team tournament, which concludes with the title match today.Before last Friday's final, the two Panthers had beaten Hoban and Kietz for the Section 3 title a week earlier, experience that undoubtedly helped."We know how they play," Dellinger said. "I played them twice during the season, then again during the section finals. So we're pretty familiar with each other. I think it helps to know your opponent, figure out their weaknesses and (how to) take advantage of them."After their Section 3 victory, Kleeman and Dellinger earned the top seed in the WPIAL tournament and a first-round bye. On Thursday at North Allegheny, the two defeated Greensburg Salem's Parker Jorgensen and Tyler Brinton, 10-2, in the quarterfinals and Thomas Jefferson's Keegan Shudy and Jake Mascaro, 6-2, 6-3 in the semifinals.Their win in the title match gave Kleeman his second consecutive WPIAL doubles championship, as the junior won it last year with Daniel Martchek."I had a different guy, but both great guys," Dellinger said.And maybe that chemistry between teammates aided the Panthers' victory in the finals."One thing I thought we did well is that they were two singles players playing doubles, and while I'm playing singles this year and Pat's playing doubles, we're still great friends and a great doubles team," Dellinger said. "So, I think that really triumphed in the end."While the two Panthers earned the WPIAL's top seed in the PIAA doubles tournament May 25-26 in Hershey, Quaker Valley's Garrett Powell and Charlie Wilson also punched their ticket to the Hershey Racquet Club with a win in the consolation match last Friday.Wilson and Powell beat Shudy and Mascaro of Thomas Jefferson, 6-3, 6-4, coming from down, 4-2, in the second set to earn the district's third and final state postseason berth."It seems like we play better when the pressure's on us," Wilson said. "There were literally like three or four games in that match where we were down love-40, and we're just like, ‘All right, now we actually gotta pick it up.' And we actually did come back in a lot of love-40 games in the match. But, yeah, we were pumped." Track and field Quaker Valley pole vaulter Joey Rakowski finished third in Friday's Baldwin Invitational with a vault of 14 feet, leading the group of Quakers who competed at Baldwin. Quaker Valley's boys 3,200-meter relay team also finished third (7:57.46), and Nat Fox finished ninth in the mile (4:27.80). Sewickley Academy's Caitlin Bungo finished fourth in the mile (5:07.08).Qualifying for the WPIAL individual championships happened on Tuesday, after deadline for this edition. The title meet will be May 17 at Baldwin. Baseball Quaker Valley picked up three important wins last week, including an impressive, 10-0 beating of first-place South Fayette in six innings — a game in which Jake Pilewicz pitched a four-hitter and Luke O'Neill drove in four runs.As of Sunday, the Quakers (9-5, 7-5) trailed third-place Bishop Canevin by just one game for the final playoff spot in Section 1-AA. Quaker Valley had crucial section games against Freedom on Monday and in Wednesday's rematch against Seton-La Salle, which beat QV, 4-1, last week. Softball Maddie Greathouse pitched a five-inning three-hitter, and Sara Manzinger drove in five runs in Sewickley Academy's 16-2 win over Northgate last week. The Panthers also beat Shady Side Academy, 8-1, on Friday to rebound from dropping a doubleheader to Vincentian two weeks ago. As of Sunday, the Panthers (8-6, 6-4) were in third place in Section 3-A. Lacrosse Sewickley Academy's boys lost their first game to a WPIAL opponent this season in a 6-5 defeat at Mt. Lebanon last Wednesday. The Panthers (10-4) recovered to beat Franklin Regional on Friday, 14-5, on senior day.Quaker Valley (8-4), meanwhile, rallied for four wins in four days last week — 13-5 over Norwin, 17-5 over Knoch, 12-3 over Baldwin and 8-2 over Aquinas Academy.The Quakers' girls (9-4) beat Fox Chapel, 10-5, and defending WPIAL champion Seneca Valley, 13-10, last week. Sewickley Academy (5-8) also beat Seneca Valley, 13-8, along with Franklin Regional, 15-7, but lost to Pine-Richland, 14-12, in between.The WPIAL boys and girls playoffs begin the week of May 14.

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