Southern Columbia has returned to a familiar position, can Trinity keep them off the perch?

Tagged under: District 3, District 4, News, Playoffs

Billy Splain | December 1, 2022

They’ve been here before. 21 times to be exact. This will the the Southern Columbia Tiger’s 22nd appearance in the PIAA state semifinal round. They won 20 of those game to advance to the state title game where they’ve won a record 12 state titles, six in 2A and 6 in single A. The Tigers have been to seven straight title games, meaning they’re 7-0 in their last seven appearances in the semi-final round. Pretty amazing considering many thought this was the year someone would knock them off that winniers perch. The Tigers come into this round with a rare three losses. Loyalsock, Danville and Mt Carmel all handed the Tigers pretty good losses throughout the regular season, double digit losses. Many though Mt. Carmel was next in line. Southern had other ideas. In what may very well be Jim Roth’s best coaching effort, with all his title teams, the Tigers rebounded once the hit the playoffs and have reached full stride. They have battled injuries, losing Garrett Garcia for the season early on, losing Wes Barnes, several other players.

So what’d Jim Roth do? Before the Line Mountain game he made his kicker a defensive end. Isaac Carter. Five foot ten, 200 pounds. A soccer player. Someone who never played a position other than punter/kicker, is now one of the Tigers leading defensive players. Then Wes Barnes came back. And the puzzle came back together. It had to happen this way. For the first time in years, the Tigers did lack depth after graduation a good portion of last years title team.  And now, thanks to Carter, they can stop the run better, something that hurt them in their three losses. That, plus now they can and are running the ball better. It isn’t just Braeden Wisloski toting the rock. Barnes and Wisloski combined for 250 yards and 4 tds last week against Bishop Guilfoyle. Make no mistake. That’s what you need to stop if you’re going to even think of having a chance at beating the Tigers. It’s what they do. And no that thier defense can stop the opposition, it’s what they are doing much better than all season.

Trinity, well, they’re on the opposite side of the equation. This year they literally made their first playoff appearance, and now, they’ll play in the schools first ever semi-final football game in history. Head Coach Jordan Hill, however, is no stranger to this position. He’s been in the state playoffs, but that was a while ago. Hill played on the 2007 & 2008 state title teams at Steelton-Highspire. So he knows what it takes to be a winner at this level. The Shamrocks too, had a rocky regular season. After facing, and getting beat each time, in the gauntlet containing Roman Catholic, Wyomissing & West Perry, all larger schools and teams, the Shamrocks started putting together a strong season. They nearly took down Hill’s former team, #1 ranked Rollers and have since rattled off five straight wins, all by double digits, one shut out, three with more than 50 points scored.

Hill says he purposely loaded the front end of the schedule with heavyweights because he lives by the mantra “to be the best you have to beat the best. I wanted my team to see what tough football looked like. It’s one thing when you watch a good team, it’s another when you can play them and take what you saw and covert it thanks to game experience” Hill said at a recent 6A playoff game that he took his players to watch. “That’s why we’re here. To show them what playoff football looks like”.

The Shamrocks aren’t a complicated team. They run a pretty simple scheme on offence. One that you just have to stop. Something that has become difficult of late for opposing teams. Caleb Wray is a nice quarterback. He’s thrown for over 1000 yards and 13 scores. Running backs Messiah Mickens, Max Schlager and Christin Joy have all combined for over 2600 yards on the ground. The Shamrock offensive like has some nice size and can move people. They do excel defensively and on special teams. Schlager and Jacob Ness are very tough defenders with over 200 tackles between them. Trinity averages 3.5 tackles for loss per game and has picked off opposing QBs 21 times.

Strap in, this may be a closer game than some suspect it will be.

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