Around District 11 with Pam and Guy: 2024 Annual Review
Tagged under: District 11, Gameday Hub, News, pfn
Guy Smith | December 30, 2024
2024.34. We started the blog in 2021 as “PA Football News” freshmen. Four years later, we graduate as seniors. This is the 34th week we blogged about football this year, well above half of the weeks for the entire year. Not too shabby!
Guy made it to 64 football games this season, just a bit short of the personal record set last year. Had he gone to all of the state championship games like normal, it would have been a new record for him. Pam’s knee replacement surgery kept her at home from more games than normal, and played a large part in the decision to attend just one of the state championship finals. Her goal was to make it back for states, and she did it.
Guy thought that this might be the year that football became his number one attended sport. But it did not happen. A weekly columnist for “Area Auto Racing News” since 1981, auto racing topped the spectator sport chart for the 55th year in a row for Guy.
In 2022 he went to 226 sporting events and vowed to cut back. In 2023 he was successful, barely, with 219 events and again vowed to cut back. This year was marginally successful again, with 215. Shooting for under 200 next year.
Here is the 2024 all sports breakdown: Racing: 83, Football: 64, Baseball: 14, Ice Hockey: 10, Soccer: 8, Lacrosse: 6, Softball: 4, Track & Field: 4, Basketball: 3, Rugby 3, Field Hockey 3, Wrestling 2, Golf 2, Volleyball 2, Swimming 2, Cross Country 2, Gymnastics 1, Track Cycling 1, Rowing 1.
The football breakdown was as follows:
District 11 High School—21
GEFA 8-Man Semi Pro—14
District 11 Related High School—10
District 11 Junior Varsity—8
High School All-Star Games—5
College Football—3
WFA Women’s Football Alliance—1
Arena Football—1
Other—1
DISTRICT 11 HIGH SCHOOL. Our bread and butter each fall. For the regular season, Pam and Guy take turns picking Friday games. Guy always looks for an excuse to visit a new stadium, Pam always picks a tried-and-true D11 team. Guy grew up with the EPC in Allentown, Pam the Colonial League in Catasauqua. But although for the past almost twenty years we have lived in the Poconos in Monroe County, we both have developed a real love for the Schuylkill County teams. This year we saw home games for Lehighton, Wilson, Marian Catholic, East Stroudsburg North, Shenandoah Valley, Minersville, Northampton, East Stroudsburg South, Allentown Central Catholic, Freedom, Blue Mountain, Catasauqua, Panther Valley, Bethlehem Catholic, Liberty, Whitehall, William Allen, Southern Lehigh, and Schuylkill Haven.
GEFA. This was our spring of GEFA, the 8-man semi-pro league. We attempted to see as many teams as possible, and in the process, added ten “new” teams or fields to our resumes. Teams we saw play at home for the first time were the Bedford Buffaloes, Berks County Raptors, Hazleton Mustangs, Coal County Nightmare, Williamsport Wildcats, Moshannon Valley Vikings, and Indiana County Crusaders. We also saw the Wilkes-Barre Warriors at a different home field, the Kickoff Classic at Central Columbia, Keystone Bowl Championship at Kutztown University, and the All-Star game at Southern Columbia. The only two we missed were the Somerset County Miners as we just ran out of weeks for them, and the Monroeville Titans, who folded early in the season.
Not sure how many GEFA games we will attend next year, as we don’t know for sure how many teams there will be, or where the teams will play their home games. We already heard that Wilkes Barre will have their third home in three seasons. The league is quite volatile in terms of teams and their home fields. We will have to wait until the season schedule is released, who are the 2025 teams, where are their home fields, and where the specialty games are going to be held. They have announced two new teams are joining the league, the Tri City Tigers and the Central PA Legends. I believe I heard the Berks County Raptors are leaving GEFA to go to an 11-man league. The league has announced they are discontinuing the All-Star Game.
D11 RELATED HIGH SCHOOL. Guy is always looking for new places to visit. The ten new ones this year in this category were five schools that were grouped with D11 for the district playoffs, three neutral state playoff sites that featured D11 teams, and new this year were regular season games with D11 teams playing at teams from outside the district. Our new stadiums with the subregion teams were Wilkes-Barre, Williamsport, Lackawanna Trail, Holy Cross, and Old Forge. For state playoffs: Shamokin (Southern Lehigh), Berwick (Northwestern Lehigh) and Central Bucks West (Southern Lehigh). And the regular season visits were Columbia Montour Vo Tech (Shenandoah Valley), and Central Columbia (Executive Education).
Most likely next season will be more of the same. Pam will pick D11 favorites and Guy will look for D11 teams playing outside of the district against teams we have never visited. Definitely want to take Pam to Holy Cross.
D11 JUNIOR VARSITY. We had been going to a Monday evening yoga class all year, but when JV football started Guy decided to go to JV games, while Pam decided to stick with the yoga, skipping only once to see Saucon Valley @ Pen Argyl. Guy likes to go to see JV when the school plays their JV games at alternate sites from where the school plays their varsity games. With that in mind, Guy’s JV games included Allentown Central Catholic at Percy Ruhe Park, Bethlehem Catholic at their high school grass field, Pocono Mountain West at the grass stadium adjacent to their turf field, and Freedom at the turf field at the school. Most fun was a JV double, after school at the no-lights Pen Argyl to the evening “Bucket” JV game featuring PM East at Pleasant Valley, our only visit to the stadium in the district where we reside. Not sure how many JV games will be on the schedule next year. Information can sometimes be hard to obtain.
HIGH SCHOOL ALL-STAR GAMES. We went to our usual all-star games, other than the Lehigh Valley All-Star Game, which we skipped this year. But we learned of another game that we had never attended, even though it’s been around longer than either of us. The Lackawanna County All-Star Dream Game was our only football game in July, and our first time at Valley View. There were two highlights, our first time ever having porketta sandwiches, and meeting PAFN colleagues, now friends, Jared and Sherryl Samuel. Probably will keep that one on our schedule next year. The Big 33 Game is THE event of the year and the Schuylkill County game the night before Thanksgiving at Schuylkill Haven has become an annual must-attend.
COLLEGE FOOTBALL. Racing, high school football, and our Wilkes University “all teams” year took up most of our Saturdays and we only made three college games all season. Sadly, we went to no additional new PSAC teams this year. Hopefully that will change next year. We went to see a Wilkes football game for the first time, then the other two college games were late in the year during the NCAA National Playoffs. A 1AA (FCS) game was Guy’s first visit to Villanova, and a D3 quarter final at Susquehanna was a first visit for Pam.
WFA. For the second year in a row, we went to see a Women’s Football Alliance, Harrisburg Havoc game. Last year they played at Harrisburg High, this year at Palmyra High School, their third home in three years. We had a good time both years, but both years the games were affected by very wet weather. Both Pam and Guy supported the team this year by completing the WFA Touchdown Run Virtual 5K as part of the Havoc team. We have every intention to go see the team play again in 2025, no matter where they pitch their home field tent.
AIF. Every once in a while, we attend an indoor arena football game. We always leave thinking it’s an OK sport, but not really football as we know and love. This year we took in a game for the Harrisburg Stampede. The Stampede were active 2009-2014 and this season returned after a ten-year hiatus. They played their home games at the Pennsylvania Farm Show Equine Arena. The odd schedule had them playing six league games, but only against two of the other four league teams, plus two non-league games. The game we attended was a non-league game against a team from a lesser league, and the Stampede won 84-0. The level of competition did not match the general admission of $25 and parking an additional $10. Within the last month, the team was signing players and selling season tickets, until they weren’t. They were still posting about new player signings on December 2, and the next day December 3, the team folded. We think every arena football team we ever saw folded not all that long after our visit.
Not Classified. There was only one new stadium visited that didn’t fit into one of the above categories and that visit was basically by accident. We headed north one Friday to see Lackawanna Trail, a subregion 1A team with D11. Arriving to find the stadium empty and the game having been moved to Saturday for reasons never fully revealed to the public, we looked for the closest game since we were already in District 2 country. Abington Heights was the closest, but having already been there and North Pocono just a few minutes farther away, so we headed to see the Trojans for the first time ever.
With both of us having grown up in the Lehigh Valley, even after first moving to the Poconos we always went to games to our south. Eventually we went to see all the EPC North schools, then the Carbon County schools, and finally we found our favorites in Schuylkill County. Since the teams to the north of us are in District 2, we never looked in that direction, even though a number of them are closer to home than many of the D11 teams. Ever so slowly we have been seeing D2 teams and/or stadiums. Currently we’ve been to a dozen of the D2 stadiums, so we may eventually try to run the table in D2 as well. No reason not to!
D11 Team of the Year. No brainer, the 3A Northwestern Lehigh Tigers ran the table and went 16-0 to win their first state championship. They are 31-1 the past two seasons. Honorable mention to Southern Lehigh who had their best season ever until running up against the eventual state champ in the 4A semifinal.
High School Game of the Year (D11 Team). Another no brainer. When the state championship was on the line, the Northwestern Lehigh Tigers held the Avonworth Antelopes to a field goal in overtime, then took the field on offense and got the job done on their first play. Honorable mention was the incredible second half comeback by Southern Lehigh to eliminate the Pottsville Crimson Tide in the district semifinal.
College Game of the Year. For the second year in a row, that honor goes to the D3 Susquehanna Riverhawks. Never ahead until a touchdown with just 38 seconds to play, they managed to hold off the upset minded Bethel University Royals in the NCAA national quarter finals. The last two games of the season for us were the best two. Honorable mention to Villanova scoring an NCAA D1 national championship come-from-behind playoff win over Eastern Kentucky, 22-17 in a game that came down to the final play.
Event of the Year. Not the NCAA national playoffs. Not the PIAA state championships. Our event of the year was the same as last year, the Big 33 game. Big 33 is more than just a game. It’s an event. It’s a happening. The atmosphere is amazing. It has that “IT” factor. If you are there in person, you know you are a part of something special. Since first attending just four years ago, this has become close to a “can’t miss” event for us. Honorable mention goes to the PIAA state finals at Cumberland Valley.
Coldest Game/Wettest Game. The GEFA Kickoff Classic in March was a triple header. By the time they got to halftime of the third game, we had already been sitting outside for six hours and ten quarters. The actual temperature had dropped to 30 degrees with the real feel of 20 degrees.
Luckily, we didn’t get too wet this year. A Saturday night Allentown Central Catholic blowout loss to Emmaus was played in a steady mist. The Harrisburg Havoc game had steady rain the entire second half, but we moved to the car as we could see the majority of the field from where we were parked.
Thanks for reading! Comments always welcome at RTRYFBAR@aol.com.
GUY & PAM 4-YEAR BLOG ERA SCORECARD
2021-2024
47/47. All District 11 Varsity Football Teams at Home.
7/8. District 11 JV Teams Playing at Different Locations from Varsity.
11/11. D11 related: Subregional Teams, Special Events or Former EPC Teams.
6/6. All-Star Games with D11 Players.
11/17. Outside D11 State Playoff Game Sites with D11 Teams.
2022-2024
11/19. NCAA D2 PSAC Colleges Including Former PSAC Schools.
- NCAA Bowl Games, National Playoffs, or NFL Sites.
2023-2024
14/20. GEFA 8-Man Semi Pro football.
2024
2/18. D11 Teams Playing Regular Season Games Outside D11. This is where the fun will be next year.
Total: 117 (Pam 108)
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