Westinghouse loses a heartbreaker to Southern Columbia

Tagged under: District 8, Gameday Hub, News, pfn, Playoffs

Marcus Sic | December 8, 2023

It was a 25 year wait to get a Pittsburgh City league team to make it back to the state championship game, now for the second year in a row Westinghouse Academy faced Southern Columbia for the class 2A title, today’s game in what was an instant classic, ended in heartache for the Bulldogs. Southern Columbia marched 99 yards to score the winning touchdown with 42 seconds left in the contest, leaving Coach Green’s team heartbroken, but not broken.

The game started off looking like it would be like the first two championship games of the week, mercy rule blowouts. On the second play of the game Southern Columbia’s Louden Murphy took a jet sweep off the right end 83 yards to the house, after Isaac Carter kicked the extra point, the Tiger’s led 7-0. On their first possession the Bulldogs moved the into So Co’s territory, seemingly on the way to tying the game. Then Carter intercepted Kahlil Green’s pass, racing 66 yards for the pick six, adding the point giving Southern a 14-0 lead. Looking like the game was getting out of hand, but the Bulldogs dug deep, making a contest of the championship game. After the pick six the Bulldog’s controlled the game holding the Tigers to 85 yards on 39 plays, until the fateful 99-yard drive at the end.

Quarterback Khalil Green took over the game moving Westinghouse up and down the field, running for 116 yards, mainly using QB counter and throwing the ball for 205 yards and 2 touchdowns, accounting for 321 yards of Westinghouse’s 368 total yards.  Green’s first TD pass was a bullet to Taymir O’Neal on a quick out, the 2-point conversion was no good. In the end it would be the Bulldogs’ inability to convert the try after touchdown that would be their undoing. Green would lead the Bulldog’s one more time in the first half to the endzone when he capped off a long drive when he took a QB counter up the middle untouched for the score. The 2-point conversion was good when Green hit O’Neal on the same out pattern to tie the score at 14, going into halftime.

Westinghouse had all of the momentum coming out of the locker room at halftime. After the teams exchanged punts Green threw a beautiful deep ball to K’Shawn Hawkins on a post pattern, for the Bulldog touchdown, giving Westinghouse a 20-14 lead. The try was stopped when a blitzing So Co linebacker clipped the heal of Green as he cut to the goal line, falling just short of scoring the conversion.

With just under six minutes to go in the game, with the Bulldogs facing forth down at midfield punted. The ball hit at the 20 and bound towards the endzone, coming to rest at the Southern Columbia one-yard line.  From there the Tiger’s began their fateful 99-yard march.

While dejected after the game Coach Green said they will turn it into a learning lesson, otherwise it would just be a loss. Coach Green spoke of how much effort that his seniors have given for the last four years, dedicating themselves not only to football, but to working on their schoolwork, developing into to young men and foregoing a social life to sacrifice for the team. While they are heartbroken, and will dwell on this loss for a long time, they will not be broken.

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