Three in a row, State College defeats Altoona for a Third consecutive district Title.

Tagged under: District 6, Gameday Hub, News, Playoffs

Todd Ross | November 11, 2023

State College was able to come away with a 16-6 win over Altoona in the District Championship for 6A in District Six.This was a hard fought physical game between two strong teams.

The first quarter didn’t have much action with State College punting to Altoona, who drove until fumbling the ball, giving it back to State College.

In the second quarter following the fumble, State College made the most of this fumble, first with a big Michael Gaul reception which set up a Ty Salazer 26 yard touchdown from an Eddie Corkery Pass; that score would be the only one of the half.

Altoona took the opening kickoff of the second half and used up almost every minute of it to get Bron Mosley to the endzone. Mosley took it in from 2 yards out but a missed extra point kept State College in the lead.

State College responded with a drive of their own ending in an Owen Yerka keeper to put them up 13-6. On the extra point attempt a failed block led to a penalty giving  State College the ball at the one. However, they failed to convert the two point attempt. 

Altoona received the ball, and after a stalled drive punted it to State College. The Little Lions drove down the field, aided by 30 yards worth of penalties, setting up John Zipf’s 25 yard field goal making the score 16-6 midway through the fourth

Ty Salazer sealed it for State College with an interception with a minute to play allowing the Little Lions to Kneel out the ball sealing the win.

Coach Lintal spoke after the game about the impact the penalty yardage had on the final score, his admiration for his players, and his respect of his opponents, “It was huge, yeah you know we went back and forth on the decision for the extra point or going for two there.I kicked myself on that one but they had two penalties on that. There’s good and bad in that so it’s so tempting that when you get on the one yard line to just be like we gotta go for it now on and you know logically it wasn’t probably the best decision but you know fortunately our kids bailed me out on that one. So getting down there at the end was huge you know, to go up two scores you really felt like that sealed the deal, and so our kids didn’t give up you know, Ty Salazer great pick to end the game just really proud of him and the overall effort. Credit to Altoona they played a great game they ran out the entire third quarter, I don’t know if we touched the ball at all so you know it was a lot of standing the sideline watching, cheering, and again I’m proud of our guys, definitely the fact they were able to come out here with a win”

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