Bill Beckner stories, Page 103

WPIAL boys soccer preview Class 4A Defending champion: Seneca Valley. The two-time defending WPIAL champion Raiders have what it takes to win it all again. They bring back senior standout Beaux Lizewski, who earned all-state honors last season, and senior goalkeeper Ryan Krumenacker, who was part of 15 shutouts. The...

It’s a mid-July evening and Jeannette is returning home from a 7-on-7 workout as the sky begins to dim toward nightfall. About 10 hours later, the team reassembles for a rise-and-shine workout. “We get done with a 7-on-7 at 8:30 at night and we’re back at 7:15 the next morning,”...

Nothing could have prepared Greensburg Central Catholic’s Marko Thomas for what he and his team faced in his first year as head coach of the Centurions. Two of his assistant coaches — William “BJ” Farrell and Joe Oslosky — died within less than a week of one another, just days...

It’s still early in an early starting high school golf season, but Derry is in mid-season form. The Trojans have shown a knack for winning close matches. On consecutive days last week, Derry won sudden-death playoffs over a pair of Section 2-2A opponents. The Trojans went to extras with Greensburg...

Bishop Canevin does not have a lot of players who might be considered NCAA Division I prospects — at least not according to the feedback from college coaches. “We’re kind of on that (5-foot-9) threshold,” Crusaders coach Richard Johnson said. “There are a lot of D-3 schools interested but not...

Maybe it was when Peyton Manning made him look at route-running differently. Or when Eli Manning discussed the mindset of third-and-long or second-and-short. There were a number of “eureka” moments for Justin Sliwoski when he attended the exclusive Manning Passing Academy in June at Nicholls State in Louisiana. The rising...

It is becoming a tradition, just like the committee had hoped. The Moe Rosenteel Player of the Year Award, given to the best all-around girls soccer player in the WPIAL since 2019, is now in its fourth year and a new winner will be crowned later in the fall. The...

Watching the Yough football program fall into disrepair was a cringe-worthy endeavor for proud alum Ben Hoffer, who used to shed tacklers and score touchdowns with ease when he played on Cougar Mountain. The new coach has big plans for his alma mater — “big” being a relative term. He...

He will show lionhead rabbits and work a bottle-rocket contest at the Westmoreland Fair later in the summer. But this week, Danny Calabrese is honing his skills as a two-way lineman for Latrobe as the Wildcats make their way into Class 4A football under first-year coach Ron Prady and his...

Familiarity is a buzz word around Southmoreland camp. The more things change with the Scotties, the more they seem to stay the same. The coaching staff is different — only in titles. Tim Bukowski was elevated from offensive coordinator to head coach, and Dave Keefer went from head coach to...

Another MLB promotion and a bobblehead? JJ Matijevic’s dream summer just keeps getting better. A day after getting his own bobblehead, Matijevic is headed back to “The Show.” The former Norwin star is set to join the Houston Astros again after a third call-up from Triple-A Sugar Land where he...

Making up for lost time he can’t get back, Mitchell Steele III plans to give everything he has to his senior football season at Jeannette. It’s all or nothing for the two-sport athlete who regrets not donning shoulder pads sooner in his high school career. “Man, I wish I had...

Gino Caesar still has the game ball from the night nobody could stop him. “My mom is going to get some stats engraved on it,” the Hempfield senior running back said. “My confidence really went up after that game.” Hempfield fans were yelling, “Hail, Caesar,” when he carried 39 times...

Nick Nguyen is set to take over the coaching reins for a golf team he used to lead into the postseason. A Norwin graduate, Nguyen is the successor to the retiring Joe Martin at Thomas Jefferson University, a Division II school in Philadelphia. Martin is stepping down after 14 seasons....

Craig Spisak is a Pennsylvania State Police trooper. He will be patrolling a new dugout next baseball season. Spisak is leaving Yough after six seasons as the head baseball coach to take the same position at Norwin. He was approved at Monday night’s Norwin School Board meeting. The upper-class lure...

It is better to be the shark than the minnow, and Latrobe might be ready to raise its fin in a new classification. A conditioning drill, implemented by Wildcats team partner FSQ Sports Training, is called “sharks and minnows.” “It’s fun,” Latrobe senior tight end and linebacker Corey Boerio said....

You can keep your entitlement. If you want something, you earn it. Roughly, these are the philosophies Ryan Kimmel lives by and seeks to perpetuate on and off the football field. The hard-hitting senior at Greensburg Central Catholic has brought a blue-collar work ethic and no-nonsense approach to the Centurions,...

Perennial power Franklin Regional has a new boys soccer coach on the eve of a new season. Lukas Petersen was hired Aug. 1 to replace Thomas Louisy, who led the Panthers for one season. Petersen was set to be a second-year assistant with the Pitt men’s soccer team. He played...

Ligonier Valley will soon join a short but growing list of local high schools with an athletic hall of fame. The district’s athletic hall of fame selection committee announced plans to form the inaugural class, with the nominee process now open. Nomination forms can be found on the high school’s...

While she had other interest from NCAA Division I soccer programs, Norwin’s Reagan Casper went with the school that felt right. The incoming senior defender made a verbal pledge to play at the University of Maryland-Baltimore County in Baltimore. The Retrievers play in the America East Conference. “I love the...

Austin and Bryce Butler have staged many shirt-ripping driveway basketball battles against one other over the years. But now they’re teaming up to play for their country on an international stage. The brothers from Latrobe are playing for the USA Basketball 3x3 U23 team in the FIBA 3x3 Nations League...

Mollie Kovalcin watched the film “A League of Their Own” so many times growing up, she lost count. It was part of her childhood and still holds a special place in her film collection. You might say it is “extra” special now. “I’ve probably seen it maybe 300 times, over...

Dropping to Class 5A means little to Hempfield, at least on paper. To second-year coach Mike Brown, the move — and accompanying chatter that things might ease up for the Spartans — are about as useful as a broken elevator. Going up or down doesn’t matter. “It’s all outside noise,”...

Dave Brozeski stops short of using air quotes when he talks about Norwin “dropping down” to Class 5A this football season. But his sentiment still is clear. Big picture: the change is inconsequential to the Knights. “If nothing else, it’s better for us in terms of the locality of opponents...

A game-winning hit to the gap or a highlight catch to seal a victory. That is the way Liam O’Donnell wants to go out at the PONY League World Series. He has dreamed about playing on this stage, and now he wants to make his mark. An incoming freshman at...