Lehigh Valley Gridiron Tidbits

Tagged under: District 11, News

Brian Ptashinski | October 21, 2020

By Brian Ptashinski @BPtashinski on Twitter

As this unprecedented 2020 high school football season winds down in the Lehigh Valley and Poconos, the stigma of Covid-19 is still wreaking havoc, leaving programs scrambling to find make-up games even if it means scheduling games during the week.

As of tonight, Notre Dame-Green Pond, who is 6-0 on the season, postponed their game with Pen Argyl Friday night. Pen Argyl, instead will head up north to face Tamaqua, as the Blue Raiders game with Pittston Area, out of District 2, was canceled. Pittston was originally scheduled to play Wilkes-Barre Area, but again covid issues at Wilkes-Barre forced that game to be canceled.

Now with that out of the way, let’s take a look back to what transpired over the weekend in the Eastern Pennsylvania Conference and the Colonial League and look ahead to this week’s games and playoff picture moving forward.

Emmaus and Nazareth kept their season’s perfect as the Green Hornets, coming off two blowout win over Allen and Dieruff by a combined score of 121-0 faced another Allentown team, the Central Catholic Vikings at J.Birney Crum Stadium and walked out with a 24-7 win to move to 3-0, behind 131 yards rushing on 21 carries by Brandon Camire. Camire scored on a six yard run to open a 10-0 lead. Nazareth got their win over then-unbeaten Bethlehem Freedom 21-7. Freedom was without starting quarterback Brian Taylor, who had some residency issues and was held out of the contest. Blue Eagle quarterback Matt Bugbee completed 17 of 26 passes for 275 yards and all 3 scores in the game.

Easton found themselves on a short end of a 7-0 score to Bethlehem Catholic, losing consecutive games and knocking them out of several state media rankings. Red Rover running back Nahjee Adams, had quite an afternoon statistically gaining 130 yards on 31 carries but could not find the end zone.

In the Monroe Division, East Stroudsburg South routed rival Stroudsburg for the “Little Brown Jug” 69-7. Will Fish, was 20-25 for 406 yards and six TD’s, Christian Sapp caught eight balls for 176 yards and two scores. Christian Arrington carried the ball 17 times for 147 yards and three touchdowns. It was the second consecutive game the Cavaliers scored 69 points.

In other scores
Northampton 38 Liberty 10
Whitehall shutout William Allen 37-0
Pocono Mountain West 21 Pleasant Valley 7
Pocono Mountain East blanked East Stroudsburg North 34-0
Parkland 49 Louis E. Dieruff 0

In the Colonial League Notre Dame remained in the driver’s seat at 6-0 with a convincing 27-0 win over once-beaten Palisades as the Crusader defense held the League’s leading rusher Mason Smeland to just 36 yards on 11 carries. Northwestern improved to 4-0 witha 39-28 win over Salisbury. Unfortunately, Northwestern and NDGP do not play each other in this abbreviated season and are in different classifications once the District XI post-season hits.

Notre Dame, hopes it can get the game with Pen Argyl scheduled for early next week, as the Crusaders close out the regular season against Wilson.

Other score around the Colonial League:
Southern Lehigh 35 Catasauqua 7
Wilson 14 Bangor 0
Saucon Valley 42 Palmerton 41
Northern Lehigh 35 Pen Argyl 14

The Official PIAA District XI Power Rankings as of 10-21-2020 are as follows:

1A (4 teams qualify for playoffs)

Tri-Valley 3-0 .675952
Williams Valley 5-1 .574093
Nativity BVM 4-2 .511561
Mahanoy Area 3-3 .490269
Marian Catholic 1-5 .285623

2A (8 teams qualify)

Palisades 4-2 .614453
Northern Lehigh 2-2 ,480854
Palmerton 1-3 .398238
Minersville 2-3 .345912
Schuylkill Haven 2-4 .305484
Pen Argyl 1-3 .235897
Catasauqua 0-4 .229907
Shenandoah Valley 1-6 .219459
Panther Valley 1-5 .210641

3A (4 teams qualify)

North Schuylkill 5-0 .762632
Notre Dame-GP 6-0 .709186
Jim Thorpe 5-1 .655759
Pine Grove 2-4 .460990
Tamaqua 3-3 .451280
Salisbury 1-3 .411256

4A (8 teams qualify)

Bethlehem Catholic 3-1 .687731
Allentown Central Catholic 2-2 .656131
Northwestern Lehigh 4-1 .652346
Pottsville 4-1 .610679
Saucon Valley 2-1 .539905
Blue Mountain 3-3 .489806
Wilson Area 2-3 .424943
Bangor 1-3 .405387
Lehighton 2-4 .370700
East Stroudsburg North 0-3 .284438

5A (4 teams qulaify)

East Stroudsburg South 2-0 .887581
Whitehall 2-2 .526905
Southern Lehigh 2-1 .523196
Pocono Mountain East 1-1 .511204

6A (8 teams qualify)

Nazareth 4-0 .870070
Parkland 2-0 .746489
Freedom 2-1 .736468
Emmaus 3-0 .708818
Stroudsburg 2-1 .644446
Pocono Mountain West 2-1 .613829
Northampton 1-2 .550803
Easton 1-2 .498050
Dieruff 0-3 .341330
Pleasant Valley 0-1 .299365
William Allen 0-3 .297382
Liberty 0-3 .248050

This week’s games:

EPC
Pocono Mountain East at East Stroudsburg South
Whitehall at Emmaus
Nazareth at Liberty
Easton at Northampton
William Allen at Parkland
Stroudsburg at Pocono Mountain West
Bethlehem Catholic at Freedom Saturday 7pm
Dieruff at Allentown Central Catholic Saturday 1pm

Colonial League
Wilson Area at Catasauqua
Salisbury at Northern Lehigh
Saucon Valley at Northwestern Lehigh
Palmerton at Palisades
Bangor at Southern Lehigh

Schuylkill League
Mahanoy Area at Blue Mountain
Pottsville at Jim Thorpe
Marian Catholic at Minersville
Lehighton at Pine Grove
Nativity BVM at Schuylkill Haven
Tri-Valley at Williams Valley
Pen Argyl at Tamaqua
Panther Valley at Shenandoah Valley

With the District XI playoffs just a few weeks away, the way the brackets will be is 2A, 4A and 6A will have eight teams that qualify and in class 1A, 3A and 5A four teams will qualify. District XI opted out of the state playoff this year.

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