Top QBs to square off in quarterfinals

Tri-State Sports & News Service

Tyler Bradley and Tawan Wesley are two of the WPIAL’s top passers.

You could say they put the ‘T’ in TD.

Now those Killer T’s will try to get their teams a big ‘W’ and move one step closer to a WPIAL title when Bradley and Our Lady of the Sacred Heart (92) face Wesley and Imani Christian (9-2) in a Class 1A quarterfinal Friday at Chartiers-Houston.

Bradley and Wesley are tied for third in the WPIAL with 29 touchdown passes. They also lead Class 1A in passing yardage: Bradley with 2,517 and Wesley 2,336. Bradley ranks fifth in the WPIAL and Wesley eighth.

Bradley, son of OLSH coach Dan Bradley, has thrown for 13 touchdowns in his past three games, including five in a 52-26 firstround win against Springdale. A junior, Bradley has completed 70 percent of his passes on the season. The Chargers have won nine games in a row, the latest being the first playoff win in school history.

“He’s really picked up his game, elevated it the last couple of weeks,” Dan Bradley said. “His completion percentage is just over 70 percent. He’s making a lot of intermediate throws and some down the field. I think that’s where we differ from Imani in that they like to take a lot more deep shots.”

Wesley and a group of athletic wide receivers have made big play after big play. Wesley, a senior, has four 300-yard passing games. He threw for seven touchdowns in one game and six in another. However, Wesley has seen his production drop the past two games, throwing for a total of 160 yards and two touchdowns. He was held without a touchdown pass in a 52-0 rout of Springdale in the first round.

“He’s been superb and a big reason why we’ve been able to do what we’re doing,” said Imani Christian coach Ronnell Heard. “He’s a confident leader and a great kid to have at that position.”

Imani Christian beat OLSH, 44-13, in the first round last season. Both were playing in a WPIAL playoff game for the first time.

Burgettstown

It’s hard to imagine many other teams getting as much enjoyment from their first-round win than Burgettstown, which captured its first playoff victory in 40 years by defeating Neshannock, 31-28, in a Class 2A thriller. Seth Phillis kicked the winning 37-yard field goal. Burgettstown (73) closed the regular season with three consecutive losses and lost first-round playoff games the previous two seasons.

“My theme the last two years has not been to get to the playoffs, but to win a playoff game,” Burgettstown coach Mark Druga said. “[Friday], it was one heck of a struggle, but we kicked the field goal with almost no time left. First playoff win in 40 years. It was for everybody: The community, the kids, the staff. It was the culmination of a lot of hard work.”

Burgettstown’s reward? A quarterfinal date with Steel Valley (9-0), the defending WPIAL and PIAA champion which has won 24 games in a row.

Steel Valley

College football has the Piesman Trophy, awarded annually to the best nonlineman play by a lineman, an honor picked up by Pitt’s Brian O’Neill last season. If there were a high school version of the award, Steel Valley senior lineman Alex Ligeros would have become a strong candidate with a play he made in a 42-13 win against Laurel in a WPIAL Class 2A first-round game.

Steel Valley had the ball at the Laurel 15-yard line when quarterback Ronnell Lawrence fired to his right for Amonte Strothers, who caught the ball and sprinted toward the end zone before being met by defenders at the 8. Strothers then tossed the ball back to Ligeros, who corralled it at the 10 and rumbled into the end zone for his first career touchdown.

“It wasn’t a designed play,” Ligeros said. “I was supposed to run out and block for him so he could score, and as I saw him being tackled, I just ran behind him because I was going to try to pick him in the end zone. Then as I was running behind him, he pitched me the ball.”

Class 1A showdown

Two of the WPIAL’s most successful programs will meet when Jeannette (10-1) takes on Rochester (8-2) in a Class 1A quarterfinal at Peters Township. Each program has won eight WPIAL titles and Jeannette trails only New Castle for most wins all time by a WPIAL school. The Jayhawks have 731.

“Great traditions. Two storied programs. We’ll see who comes out on top,” Jeannette coach Roy Hall said.

The two played in last year’s semifinals with Jeannette coming out on top, 3020.