Michael Love stories, Page 15

The Franklin Regional girls basketball team moved one game closer to its goal of a Section 1-5A championship Tuesday evening. The Panthers held off a challenge from playoff-bound section foe Fox Chapel and completed a season sweep of the Foxes with a 59-43 victory. FR moved to 13-5 overall and...

Courtney Jackson and Tui Faumuina-Brown shined during their time in a Gateway football uniform. Neither skipped a beat at the next level — Jackson at Syracuse and Arkansas State and Faumuina-Brown at UConn. Their impact was significant up to and including the final games of their collegiate careers, bowl victories...

Gateway wrestling coach Ryan Sula said he didn’t see a lot of good things early on during the two-day Allegheny County tournament Jan. 17 and 18 at Fox Chapel High School. “I thought we got out to a slow start in the first round or two and didn’t wrestle very...

Saphia Davis wrestled just two matches in December before being forced off the mat because of injury. She made quick work of Burrell’s Cierra Molnar with a 48-second pin in Plum’s season opener and pinned Norwin’s Avalin Barry in 5:55 of their 130-pound bout during a dual match Dec. 18....

Each year at the Allegheny County wrestling tournament, one can find Plum wrestlers contending for championships and podium finishes. This year was no exception, as multiple Mustangs were in contention on the second day of the two-day tournament Jan. 17 and 18 at Fox Chapel High School. When all of...

The Kiski Area boys basketball team had payback on its mind Friday night from a six-point loss to Section 2-5A rival Hampton on Dec. 20. Mission accomplished. The Cavaliers, ahead by six at halftime and nine at the end of three quarters, weathered a couple of Hampton second-half rally attempts...

A trio of Kiski Area individual swimmers and one relay team have the biggest targets on their backs as top seeds for Saturday’s Westmoreland County Coaches Association championships at Derry. Sophomore Leah Kunkle has the fastest time this season among Westmoreland swimmers in the girls 200-yard individual medley. Senior Riley...

Colyn Haugh remembers the tough, challenging games against Kiski Area during his days as a high school football player at Franklin Regional. Now, the newly hired Cavaliers coach hopes to bring the same intensity and high-level ability and effort he saw in his one-time rival more than two decades ago....

Deer Lakes girls basketball rolled past South Allegheny on Monday, winning the Section 2-3A contest 54-32 for its 11th victory of the season. The Lancers, with a mix of veteran talent and newcomers giving the program a spark, have surpassed their win total — nine — for the previous two...

Forty years have passed since Deer Lakes brought home the Alle-Kiski Valley’s first and only PIAA girls basketball championship. The Lancers defeated Palmyra from District 3 for the championship in comeback fashion 45-43 on March 29, 1985. Deer Lakes rolled through an undefeated postseason to capture WPIAL and state gold....

The Gateway boys basketball team fell short in its first crack at Section 1-5A leader Uniontown. The Gators were competitive in the Jan. 7 matchup with the Red Raiders, but a 22-12 margin in the second quarter ended up being the difference in the 82-73 Uniontown win. Gateway, which got...

Dino Nadarevic kicked off his 2025 indoor track and field season in the shot put with a pair of meets at Hempfield Area High School. The Gateway senior recorded a top attempt of 56 feet, 11½ inches Dec. 19 and 56-5½ in his return to Hempfield on Jan. 7. He...

The Plum boys and girls bowling teams swept past the competition to win last year’s Saint Vincent College Bearcat Challenge. The Mustangs were the hunted Jan. 5 in their return to the tournament at Hillview Lanes in Greensburg. But the bowlers for both Plum teams would not be denied a...

Plum track and field coach Matt Proskin said he is energized by what he is seeing from his sprinters, jumpers and throwers as the winter indoor season progresses. “We have our best numbers since we brought the (indoor) program back,” Proskin said Wednesday after conducting a top-end speed day workout...

In Monday’s 70-36 Section 1-A victory over Springdale, St. Joseph girls basketball players made 29 field goals. Of those 29, 21 came off assists. It continued a winning trend from the Sewickley Academy section game four days earlier where team members produced 15 assists in a 59-31 victory. “It was...

Chris Heater, while guiding his Kiski Area boys wrestling team through the 2024-25 season, also is counting down the days to the start of construction of the Chuck Tursky Wrestling Training Center at Kiski Area High School. Heater said the project, which will revamp a vast auxiliary athletic space near...

The Gateway hockey team began 2025 with a key division win over Wilmington at Palmer Imaging Arena. But it wasn’t easy. Senior captain CJ Evans tallied a hat trick as the Gators built a 5-0 lead in the second period. But Wilmington started to chip away at the deficit and...

Aliya Rassiane packed a lot of positive results into her first varsity season with the Gateway swim team. The sprint freestyle and butterfly specialist had a breakout freshman year which culminated in WPIAL Class 2A medals in the 50-yard freestyle (fifth), the 100 butterfly (fifth) and the 400 free relay...

Plum graduates and former Mustangs football teammates Reed Martin and Josh George hope to live out their dreams of playing in the National Football League. Both recently indicated through social media posts that they will take the steps over the next couple of months to get on the radar of...

The Plum hockey team is on a roll with eight wins in 10 games through an 11-0 rout of Kiski Area on Jan. 6, at Palmer Imaging Arena in Delmont. Ten Mustangs accounted for the 11 goals, and senior goaltender Landon Gribbin-Horner stopped all nine shots he faced for the...

The Riverview girls basketball team is small in numbers this season, but it is big in terms of wins. The Raiders, who have played some games this season with just the five starters seeing the floor, are 6-2 overall and 2-0 in Section 4-2A. “At the beginning, it was rough...

Something had to give Tuesday evening as the Knoch and Deer Lakes boys basketball teams met with a share of first place on the line in Section 1-4A. The Lancers came in having won their first four section games, while the Knights were undefeated in three section matchups. Things didn’t...

Soon after a trip to the 2024 PIAA Class 2A swimming championships, where she earned a silver medal in the 100-yard butterfly final against Bedford phenom and U.S. Olympic Trials qualifier Leah Shackley, Kira Schrecongost started a connection that eventually would become her future home in swimming and academics. “(Duquesne...

Freeport graduate Josie Russo enjoyed a stellar high school volleyball career with all-state honors while leading the powerful Yellowjackets to PIAA gold. She made the transition to the college game this fall at Butler County Community College, and her production didn’t wane. Russo was one of just four freshmen from...

The second annual Pittsburgh Holiday Hoops Classic will be Sunday at PPG Paints Arena, and two Alle-Kiski Valley girls teams will kick off the quadrupleheader. Past section rivals Kiski Area and Fox Chapel will play at 1 p.m. “The girls are super excited,” said Foxes coach Marty Matvey, who has...