Don Rebel stories, Page 18
Defending PIAA champions start season atop Trib HSSN state football rankings
Welcome to the 2025 high school football season, which kicks off for most schools across the state with Week Zero games this weekend. Before this season kicks off, here is a quick refresher course on the six 2024 PIAA champions. District 12 powerhouse St. Joseph’s Prep captured its third straight...
This week on Trib HSSN for the week of Aug. 18, 2025
Let the games begin! We kick off a new scholastic sports season with the start of high school football 2025 this week here on the TribLive High School Sports Network. Trib HSSN has video and audio coverage of Week Zero, with more than 25 WPIAL, District 6 and District 9...
WPIAL Class 6A preview: A decade in, 6-class system produces little big-school drama
Welcome to the 10th season of Class 6A football in the WPIAL and PIAA. The decision for the state to expand from four to six classes in football, boys and girls basketball and baseball and softball prior to the start of the 2016-17 school year was driven by bigger schools...
Countdown to Kickoff ’25: Saturday games not extinct just yet in WPIAL football
There was a time when Saturday afternoon marked a busy end to a high school football weekend around the WPIAL. Twenty years ago, 11 district schools played their home football games on Saturdays, with Bishop Canevin, Duquesne, Geibel Catholic, Riverview, Serra Catholic, Shady Side Academy, Shenango, South Side, Summit Academy,...
Countdown to Kickoff ’25: 26 WPIAL teams have new coaches this fall
The WPIAL football coaching pendulum continues to swing between a lot of offseason changes and not as many new sideline generals. Prior to the 2023 season, there were 26 head coaching changes. Last year was a lot less with only 17. This offseason saw 26 new football coaches hired to...
Countdown to Kickoff ’25: Innovative playoff format enters 2nd season
This will be the second season of the innovative WPIAL football playoff format. The trusty old abacus was retired last fall when it came to figuring out wild card playoff teams. The WPIAL football steering committee decided which schools qualified for the district playoffs as wild cards instead of using...
Countdown to Kickoff ’25: Looking back at last year’s champs
While we continue to prepare for the new high school football season, Countdown to Kickoff 2025 looks back at the 2024 WPIAL football season. Conference champs First, here is a rundown of all the regular season conference champions from last fall: 6A – Central Catholic 5A Allegheny Six – Upper...
Scrimmage schedule set for Western Pa. high school football teams
Training camps officially begin Monday for all 127 WPIAL, City League and independent teams. The week then concludes with a scrimmage. The second week of camp concludes with most teams playing a Week Zero game Aug. 22-23. There are still a few schools that prefer a second scrimmage instead of...
Experienced Montour aims to contend for Parkway Conference crown
The 2024 football season at Montour was a tale of two seasons. A thrilling Week 8 victory over Aliquippa put the Spartans alone in first place in the Class 4A Parkway Conference with one week left in the regular season. With a chance to win the conference title outright, Montour...
Seneca Valley turns to one of its own to take reins of football program
There is a mix of old and new at Seneca Valley, where the hope is that experienced players and a new coaching staff will put the Raiders in perfect harmony for a return to the WPIAL 6A football playoffs. Ron Butschle stepped down as coach after last season, ending his...
Mt. Lebanon looks to improve in 2nd year under Greg Perry
The first year for Greg Perry as head coach at Mt. Lebanon turned into a tale of two seasons. Through the first five weeks, the Blue Devils lost their first five games, including their first two games of Class 6A conference play. They were shutout once and averaged only 10...
Central Catholic has experience, firepower to repeat in Class 6A
In only his second season as head coach at Central Catholic, Ryan Lehmeier etched his name in the record books next to John Fischetti, Art Walker and Terry Totten — Vikings football coaches who have won WPIAL or PIAA championships. Central Catholic ended a three-year golden drought by knocking off...
Coaching inspiration, experience spark Canon-McMillan in 2025
One of the big WPIAL football stories this offseason involved the coaching situation at Canon-McMillan. Ten-year veteran Big Macs coach Mike Evans is battling cancer for a second time. While he remains optimistic for his long term health following surgery to remove his tumor in July, he realized he would...
North Allegheny has questions to answer in quest to return to top of Class 6A
Editor’s note: Trib HSSN will publish team-by-team previews for one conference per day until the start of the high school football season Aug. 22. North Allegheny was trying to make history last year and become only the second team to win three straight outright WPIAL championship games in the highest...
2025 Trib HSSN Preseason Football All-Star Team: Mt. Lebanon’s Patrick Smith
Patrick Smith registered more than 2,700 yards from scrimmage and was part of 27 touchdowns as a junior quarterback last season. However, he didn’t get the kind of recognition a player with those kinds of numbers for a Class 6A would usually get because the 2024 campaign was a bit...
2025 Trib HSSN Preseason Football All-Star Team: Thomas Jefferson’s Tyler Eber
The one constant in more than three decades of excellence for Thomas Jefferson football is having stud players on the line, where longtime coach Bill Cherpak shined in his playing days at Steel Valley and Pitt, and a bell cow running back to carry the load of the running game....
Indiana takes another step forward, wins Class 4A Trib Cup
Last year, Indiana was close but ended the year with no cigar, finishing second in district and state baseball as well as the Class 4A Trib Cup. This year, the Little Indians turned silver into gold on the baseball diamond and in the chase for cup glory. Indiana rallied with...
Softball dynasty sparks Neshannock to another Trib Cup victory in Class 2A
Heading into the 2025 spring sports season, the close battle for the Class 2A Trib Cup title came down to a two-school chase. Then another perfect season on the softball diamond turned the nail biter into a runaway victory. Neshannock captured a fourth straight Class 2A Trib Cup on the...
Fueled by girls sports, Peters Township repeats as Class 5A Trib Cup champs
After winning a Sports Cup in the competition’s very first school year in 2003-2004, it took 20 years for Peters Township to capture its second crown in 2023-2024. Now it took the Indians only 12 months to capture a third. “This is a great honor and a testament to the...
North Allegheny remains unbeatable in Trib Cup all-sports competition
The more things change in high school sports, the more they stay the same, especially when it comes to the chase for the Trib Cup in Class 6A. North Allegheny wins again. The Tigers are 9 for 9 in Class 6A Trib Cups and remain perfect with 22 Sports Cup...
2025 Trib 25 Preseason Football All-Star Team: Fort Cherry’s Matt Sieg
Editor’s note: Each day through Aug. 3, Trib HSSN will profile one member of the 2025 Trib 25 preseason high school football all-star team. Fort Cherry quarterback and safety Matt Sieg has rushed for 6,176 yards and passed for 4,177 yards in his career and, last fall, joined former Jeannette...
Quaker Valley stands out among Class 3A schools to repeat as Trib Cup champs
Quaker Valley started the school year strong in the fall of 2024 and ended it with a double golden bang in the spring of 2025 to not only repeat as Class 3A Trib Cup champions, but crush the competition in winning its fifth title in the last six years. The...
Greensburg Central Catholic captures 5th Trib Cup in 6 years in Class A
Midway through the 2020s, Greensburg Central Catholic is closing in on clinching school-of-the-decade honors in Class A after claiming a second consecutive Class A Trib Cup, its fifth in the last six years. The Centurions remain alone in third place overall after winning the schools 11th Sports Cup, trailing only...
Winners of Trib Cup for all-around sports excellence set to be revealed
Over the course of the last two-plus decades, 24 WPIAL schools have won at least one Sports Cup, which recognizes the best sports programs in each WPIAL class over the entire school year. The first Sports Cup was handed out after the 2003-2004 school year to North Allegheny in 4A,...
Trib HSSN 2024-25 parade of champions: Individual titles
There is no I in team, but there is an I in the word impressive. These district athletes rose above all others to claim gold in their respective high school sports in the 2024-2025 school year. This salute to champion’s parade includes these folks who marched alone to what turned...
