By Michael Boytim

mboytim@altoonamirror.com

Bishop Guilfoyle Academy was already the favorite to win the District 6 Class 1A championship this year, but the way the Marauders lost the Laurel Highlands Athletic Conference championship in the final minute to Penn Cambria last Friday may have made things even tougher on the other seven teams in the bracket.

“I think Friday night helped us refocus for sure,” BG coach Justin Wheeler said. “We want to make sure we don’t leave anything else to anyone else and control our own destiny. I think these guys are really going to have a great week and that this will hopefully be our best game of the year. I think they are pretty upset and pretty fired up. I think that loss has helped us become a lot more focused.”

The Marauders open the postseason against Juniata Valley, a team they have played six previous times during Wheeler’s time coaching the team. BG is 5-1 in those games with the lone loss coming in 2018.

“I want to see our kids be competitive and understand the fact that they can be in a game like this,” Juniata Valley coach Bill Musser said. “They can compete and be competitive against a team like this. When I say that, I mean as long as we’re competitive, we have a chance to win. I want to see that out of my kids this week.”

Juniata Valley is just 4-6 and is coming off a loss to District 5 power Windber. The Green Hornets knocked off Curwensville two weeks ago to lock up a playoff spot.

“The last couple weeks, they have been running the ball pretty well,” Wheeler said. “They have a big running back (Vinny Hoover), and he must have 300 or 400 yards in the last three games.”

Musser said BG has too much talent to focus on any couple players.

“Oh my goodness. We have to be ready for all the players on their roster,” Musser said. “We know they are a well-coached team that has experience at this level. We just have to come out and match their physicality and keep them in front of us and not let big plays happen and see if good things can come out of that.”

Juniata Valley has been ravaged by injuries this season, and with some younger players getting a chance to play, Musser said it is important to get them postseason experience.

“We had some kids that probably would not have seen the field as much this season if not for the injuries,” Musser said. “So, that’s why we went into the playoffs despite a 4-6 record to give those kids another week of experience.”

Rematch part one

Two of the four District 6 Class 1A quarterfinal games will be rematches from earlier this season, and one — Portage at Northern Cambria — happened just last week, though the game was at Portage.

Second-seeded Northern Cambria won the first meeting, 28-14.

“We knew they were good,” Portage coach Marty Slanoc said. “But we knew throughout the season, we weren’t quite at full strength for one reason or another and just had some lapses. We learned Friday night that we can play with them. I think our kids after the game were energized. They have some athletes, but we have athletes too. We have some guys like Bode Layo and Issac Willinsky that can really make a difference on both sides of the ball. There was some confidence gained.”

The Colts won a District 6 title two years ago and lost in last year’s semifinals to eventual champion Cambria Heights. Portage is returning to the postseason after missing out last year.

“We have to not turn the ball over,” Slanoc said. “We just have to be more consistent and learn from watching some of the things they did. They had a little extra push at times that maybe we didn’t, but we have to protect the ball and limit turnovers.”

Rematch part two

The other rematch is one Glendale would like to forget.

The Vikings traveled to Claysburg-Kimmel after a hard-fought loss to Mount Union and had their worst performance of the season in a 47-0 loss.

On Friday, the fourth-seeded Vikings will host the fifth-seeded Bulldogs.

“We learned a lot about ourselves that week,” Glendale coach Dave “Spank” Trexler said. “Adversity is a great teacher, and we learned that you can’t always control what happens, but you can control how you respond. It’s easy to make this about redemption, when they dominated us a little less than a month ago, but redemption is not our goal. We want to score more points than they do, win the game and advance.”

Glendale and Claysburg are both coming off lopsided losses in the final week of the regular season.

“We have a lot of be proud of — we have the ICC North championship that we can hang our hat on, but we just don’t want to hang our hat on only that,” C-K coach Chuck Kassick said. “We faced two freaking stud running backs the last two weeks. Everett had some injuries and got banged up in the middle of the season and got some guys back.”

Making matters worse for Claysburg-Kimmel is that it lost its own stud running back to an injury against the Warriors.

“(Mark) Lattieri got hurt early, and that changed up a lot of what we were doing and things we had planned,” Kassick said. “We have to bounce back. It’s a new season, and we have a chance to redeem ourselves. It’s a great opportunity for our kids.”

Lattieri’s status for Friday is unknown.

“It’s day to day right now,” Kassick said. “He’s been feeling better as the weekend has gone on, but he’s a kid. I won’t put a kid in a spot where his life might change or be different because a game in high school. We’ll see what our trainer and physical therapy do this week and see if Mark can go. We are preparing as if he’s not going to be there, because you would rather be prepared.”

For Glendale to make it a competitive game, the Vikings will need to take better care of the ball in the rematch.

“Turnovers are always a major concern and a key factor in any game,” Trexler said. “When playing a team that is as talented and well coached as Claysburg, you can’t give them extra opportunities, so you must protect the football. Along with protecting the football, we must raise our intensity level and play every play like we are the third gorilla in line for Noah’s Ark and it has started to rain.”

Kassick is preparing his team for a fired-up effort from Glendale.

“I’m sure there’s tons of bulletin board material for them from the last game,” Kassick said. “There’s no doubt, but I said that Glendale score was not indicative of the team that they are. They turned the ball over a ton, and we caught lightning in a bottle that night on both sides of the ball. We have to assume if they don’t have those turnovers, it would have been much closer. If we aren’t focused, it could be a one and done.”

While Trexler is happy to be hosting Friday’s game for the community, he said his team is simply in business mode.

“It is always a positive to play at home, especially for our families, fans and the Glendale community,” Trexler said. “But as far as the players, they didn’t care if we had to travel to ‘Any Town, USA,’ they are just excited to have earned the opportunity to play another week. And to play against the best team in our section just adds to the excitement.”