Bill Beckner stories, Page 16
Westmoreland H.S. notebook: Jeannette names new boys, girls soccer coaches
The Jeannette boys and girls soccer teams will be under new leadership this fall. Jayhawks alum Luke Brummett takes over the boys team, while a veteran coach in the county, Derek Cuthbert, is now in charge of the girls. Brummett, 25, replaces Steve Pons, who resigned after two seasons. Brummett,...
Jeannette football, basketball star Kymon’e Brown named TribLive Westmoreland County boys athlete of the year
Kymon’e Brown is constantly striving. The rising senior at Jeannette aims to be a better leader each time he joins his teammates, and he is always looking to improve with an eye toward one-upping his opponents and proving himself. He wants to be great — not just good, as he...
Franklin Regional grad Chuck Tragesser having solid summer on links
From one shot to the next, one tournament after the other, Chuck Tragesser is carrying over momentum in what has been a strong summer on the golf course. The Franklin Regional alum and rising redshirt junior at Robert Morris won the 32nd Western Pennsylvania Golf Association Spring Stroke Play Championship...
Jeannette boys basketball team wants to add another, more special title to its resume
Winning a WPIAL championship last winter meant a lot to the Jeannette boys basketball team. But a different title — should the host Jayhawks win it Saturday — would carry a different meaning. Special meaning. “We want to do it for his parents,” Jeannette rising junior guard Markus McGowan said,...
Franklin Regional shortstop Luke Williams pivots to Vanderbilt
When he first decommitted from Virginia three weeks ago, it was tough for baseball player Luke Williams to mentally erase the image he had of himself in a Cavaliers uniform. Virginia and AI had already given him an idea of what he’d look like in his fresh digs and he...
Former Latrobe basketball star Austin Butler settles into new role as Hempfield coach
Granted, it was a low-key summer tournament game on just his 38th day on the job, but Austin Butler’s stomach didn’t seem to be in knots when he took the floor to coach Thursday night at Jeannette. He looked different somehow in Hempfield blue and white, but he was in...
Mark Katarski returns to alma mater as Mt. Pleasant boys basketball coach
When he was in middle school, Mark Katarski sharpened his No. 2 pencils and kept score for the Mt. Pleasant boys basketball team. He reveled in the details, the facts and figures that go into a game. “It was the 1990-91 season,” Katarski said. “My senior year, in 1995, I...
5th edition of Tre Cunningham Memorial Basketball Tournament set to tip off
“New” is the theme for the 5th annual Tre Cunningham Memorial Basketball Tournament set for Thursday through Saturday at the Jeannette elementary and high schools. New coaches and new teams will greet attendees at an event that honors late Jayhawks great Tre Cunningham, a three-sport standout who died in a...
Former Seton Hill women’s basketball coach Katarski expected to be hired as Mt. Pleasant boys coach
Mt. Pleasant will vote Wednesday to hire recommended candidate Mark Katarski, a Vikings alum, as boys head basketball coach. Katarski most recently served as interim boys basketball coach at Hempfield during last season’s investigation of former Spartans coach Bill Swan. He will replace Annie Malkowiak, who was not retained after...
Westmoreland County campus clippings: Seton Hill’s Jack Whalen named to Gold Glove Team
Covering more ground than the sun some days, Jack Whalen has been a sure out in center field for Seton Hill baseball. His play has been golden. The junior was rewarded for his effort by being named to the American Baseball Coaches Association/Rawlings Division II Gold Glove Team. He is...
Monessen playmaker TyVaughn Kershaw gets 1st Division I offer
One of the WPIAL’s top big-play threats last football season is beginning to draw NCAA Division I college attention. And he wants more schools to know his name. TyVaughn Kershaw, a rising senior running back at Monessen, has his first FCS offer after Tennessee at Martin reached out this weekend....
TribLive Westmoreland County softball all-stars: Cam Ponko’s focus helped make Penn-Trafford state champs
Player of the year Cam Ponko Sr., 3B, Penn-Trafford Tears welled up in Cam Ponko’s eyes as she reflected on a banner season. A championship season. A career season. A player-of-the-year type of season. The Penn-Trafford third baseman was flooded with emotion after a total recall of her accomplishments —...
Westmoreland high school notebook: Late Jeannette star enters national hall of fame
Posthumously, the late Zach Washington became the fifth former Jeannette standout to be inducted into the National High School Hall of Fame. Washington’s children, Zach Washington Jr. and Laurie Washington, spoke on behalf of their father last weekend at a ceremony at Umstattd Hall in Canton, Ohio. Washington was 80...
Track gold highlights memorable spring at Norwin
Norwin will remember the 2025 spring sports season for its impressive wins, highlight performances and gold medals. There was plenty to talk about at year-end banquets. Track and field was the standard bearer after a banner season. The boys and girls teams won WPIAL Class 3A championships, the boys celebrating...
Hempfield lineman picks Harvard for ‘great balance between academics and football’
Despite a number of high-end scholarship offers from Power 4 and Group of 5 schools, Brock Heisler has opted to play college football in the nonscholarship Ivy League. Don’t be too quick to judge the big bruiser from Hempfield. A 4.0 student-athlete, he probably knows something the rest of us...
State champion Penn-Trafford softball team plans youth camp
After Penn-Trafford won the PIAA softball championship Friday at Penn State, Warriors coach Denny Little had his players take photos with some younger fans celebrating from the bleachers at Beard Field. He said it would be nice to make it a tradition. The next generation of girls will have a...
Westmoreland County campus clippings: Seton Hill pitcher headed to West Virginia
Rising redshirt senior Ian Korn, who had an exceptional season for Seton Hill, is transferring to West Virginia for a season of Division I baseball. Korn, the NCBWA Division II National Pitcher of the Year, went 11-2 with a 1.81 ERA and 83 strikeouts in 84 innings this year. Opponents...
Former Norwin standout fills scoresheet as college hockey freshman
Mario Cavallaro was a sophomore in 2022 when he played a key role in Norwin’s PIHL Penguin Cup championship run. He scored the game-winning goal in the finals on an assist from his brother, Anthony. But Super Mario was far from finished. Cavallaro went on to play for the South...
Westmoreland County high school notebook: Recruiting heating up for Franklin Regional defensive back
Jaymier Austin began showing up on the college football recruiting radar last summer when three Division I programs — Purdue, Youngstown State and Marshall — offered him scholarships. The rising senior at Franklin Regional continues to garner interest, with eight total offers on the table for the 6-foot-4, 180-pound wide...
Penn-Trafford makes lasting memories with state title win
UNIVERSITY PARK — Giuliana Youngo might have played her last softball game Friday night. The Penn-Trafford senior right fielder, though, probably will be back at Penn State’s Beard Field, the site of the Warriors’ 2-0 win over Greencastle-Antrim in the PIAA Class 5A championship. She has enrolled at Penn State....
Penn-Trafford blanks Greencastle-Antrim to claim 2nd PIAA softball championship
UNIVERSITY PARK — Penn-Trafford has won two PIAA softball championships without ever winning a WPIAL title, and that is just fine with coach Denny Little. “Sometimes you have to eat your dessert first,” Little said Friday night after the Warriors captured their second state title in six years with a...
Fox Chapel’s Harran Zureikat, nation’s top-ranked kicker, commits to Georgia
Fox Chapel’s Harran Zureikat, the No. 1-ranked kicker in the country by Kohl’s Kicking Camps, made a verbal commitment Thursday to Georgia. The five-star rising senior chose the Bulldogs of the Southeastern Conference over offers from Pitt, Penn State, Akron, Boston College and Maryland. He received the offer from Georgia...
PIAA Class 5A softball state championship preview: Penn-Trafford vs. Greencastle-Antrim
Class 5A Penn-Trafford (23-3) vs. Greencastle-Antrim (22-3) 4 p.m. Friday at Beard Field at Nittany Lion Softball Park, Penn State District-place: Penn-Trafford 7-2; Greencastle-Antrim 3-3 PIAA titles: Penn-Trafford 1 (2019); Greencastle-Antrim 1 (2009) Road to State College: Penn-Trafford — Defeated 6-1 Central Mountain, (3-2), 3-1 Red Land (6-5) and 7-3...
Penn-Trafford playoff run wakes up the echoes of 2019 state championship team
Former Penn-Trafford outfielder Brooke Cleland recalls catching the final out at Beard Field and squeezing her glove around the softball. It was like time stopped for a millisecond. Then, in a rush of emotion and noise unlike anything she and her teammates had ever experienced, it became official: The Warriors...
Multiple heroes have Penn-Trafford on brink of 2nd state softball title
If you hit, you play. That is Denny Little’s mantra for the Penn-Trafford softball team, and the ninth-year coach has an abundance of talented hitters to pencil onto his lineup card. “You take your nine best hitters, and you find a place for them,” Little said, not giving away any...
