Oct 18, 2014 4 min read

After some early struggles to start the season, Trinity High School’s football team was headed to the bottom of the WPIAL Class AAA Big 9 Conference standings.

The Hillers started 1-4 but roared back with three consecutive wins, the latest a shocker that saw them roll past West Mifflin, 31-13, Friday night at Hiller Field.

Trinity’s playoffs hopes are very much alive.

The Hillers will not only will have to win their regular-season finale at Ringgold next Friday, but also get some help in other conference games.

But, the Hillers are still in playoff contention.

“I’m really proud of those guys,” Trinity head coach Ryan Coyle said. “We came in with the game plan that we had to control the clock, score and keep them off the field. We couldn’t have won that game without the hogs up front on both the offensive and defensive lines.”

West Mifflin (5-2, 6-2) came into the game with three straight wins, but this game belonged to Trinity from the start. The Hillers (3-4, 4-4) pushed the Titans around and controlled the ball throughout most of the game.

It was the most dominating and consistent performance of the season for Trinity.

“We came in wanting to run the football,” said offensive lineman Aaron Britton. “We had some success pancaking them right off the bat and we just kept it going.”

Trinity opened the game with an impressive 15-play drive that featured 13 running plays and took 7:34 off the clock. The drive ended when Robert West found the end zone from four yards.

West Mifflin put together a 10-play drive that spanned close to five minutes, tying the score on a four-yard touchdown run by DiAngelo Mitchell.

Trinity dug and countered with another lengthy drive, a 12-play effort that took close to seven minutes. All of Trinity’s 12 plays were on the ground and the Hillers took a 14-7 lead when quarterback Forest Cullings scored from six yards.

The Hillers’ defense forced a three-and-out and after a nice punt return by Nick Moretti, Trinity quickly struck for a score. It took the Hillers only three plays, all runs by Colton Jordan, to extend the lead to 21-7 when Jordan scored on a 14-yard scamper.

“The defense has been coming along,” said Coyle. “I wish we would have played defensively like this early in the season, but we are in this business to make kids better. You can tell that we are far better than when we started the season. That momentum swing was big, and once we stopped them and punched it in real quick, I think it took some wind out of their sails.”

Trinity’s defense keyed on Mitchell, containing the outstanding senior who came into the game with more than 1,400 yards. He was held to less than 100 yards for the game.

Mitchell did get into the end zone in the third quarter to pull West Mifflin to within 21-13, but the Hillers answered with another lengthy drive, this time 11 plays, ending with West scoring his second short rushing touchdown.

Trinity finished the night with more than 200 rushing yards, with West and Jordan doing the bulk of the work.

“They did exactly what they do; we just couldn’t stop them,” said West Mifflin head coach Ray Braszo. “We are not a big team and defense has been a problem for us this year, especially against big and strong teams like them.”

And the Hillers enter the final week of the regular season with the playoffs a possibility.

“For every negative, I say we have to find two positives,” Coyle said. “And right now, I can find a lot of positives with us. We just have to keep getting better. We have won four out of five and right now we have a group that believes.”