Bethel’s offense has HR hitter
Sometimes, Terron Murphy jump-starts Bethel Park. Sometimes, he seals the deal. All the time, the Black Hawks like giving him the ball.
Murphy, Bethel Park’s speedy senior running back, leads the Black Hawks into a big game tonight against one of their last remaining rivals. Upper St. Clair and Baldwin are gone from the schedule, moved down to Class 5A, but Mt. Lebanon (6-3, 4-1) visits Bethel Park (5-3, 5-0) for a 7:30 p.m. kickoff that will decide the Class 6A Southeastern Conference — and Murphy is just one week removed from running for 206 yards in a 35-0 rout of Altoona.
“He’s got tremendous speed, makes a lot of guys miss,” said Bethel Park coach Jeff Metheny. “When he gets in the open field, he can take it 70, 80 yards, and he’s done that a lot.”
Twice this season, Murphy has scored the game’s first touchdown for Bethel Park on a run of 70 yards or more. And twice, he has scored Bethel Park’s final touchdown on a run of 40 yards or more, including last week when he had two touchdowns of 65 or longer. You could call him a homerun threat every time he touches it.
Murphy rushed for 1,225 yards last year as a junior, including a 326-yard game at Upper St. Clair. He’s running behind an inexperienced offensive line that returned just one starter, junior major-college prospect James Gmiter, but has 918 yards on the season.
“He’s gotten better in short-yardage situations, learned to put his foot in the ground and do some things we’ve coached him to do,” Metheny said.
Having Murphy to bolster the ground game is especially important this year for Bethel Park, which entered the season without a Metheny under center for the first time since 2011. Metheny’s son, Levi, was a four-year starter who graduated and left a major hole to fill — on the field and, in some ways, emotionally.
“Personally, it hasn’t been an easy transition,” said the elder Metheny. “That first week, it wasn’t 15 years since he hadn’t been on the bus, but doggone, it felt like it.”
Metheny’s replacement, senior Cole Rogers, has thrown for nine touchdowns, rushed for eight and done enough to put the Black Hawks in position for their first outright conference title since 2009.
“He’s having a really good year,” Metheny said. “He does some things better than Levi, but I coach him the same way I coached my son. He’s done really well running the ball, his percentage is very high and he’s playing good football for us.”
And when Rogers hands off to Murphy, the percentage of a game-changing run isn’t too bad, either.
Overlooked, underrated
Logan Malatak, West Allegheny. The Indians are loaded with offensive and defensive playmakers, a major reason why they’re undefeated and the No. 1 team in Class 5A, but Malatak has helped the cause, too. A 5-foot-9, 160-pound sophomore, Malatak has blocked one field goal and four punts this season, including two last week in a surprising rout of then-No. 2 Woodland Hills. One of his blocks at Woodland Hills was returned for a 2yard touchdown, and one three weeks ago at then-No. 1 Upper St. Clair set up a short touchdown.
Name of the week
Canyon Tuman, North Allegheny. A 6-6, 220-pound junior, Tuman has been one to know on the WPIAL boys volleyball scene since his freshman year. But in a win last week at Hempfield, he scored for the first time on the football field, where his last name is more familiar and his first name is still just as grand. Tuman’s father is former Steelers tight end Jerame Tuman, who was on the Super Bowl XL-winning team. Canyon caught a 14-yard touchdown pass last week in the second quarter.