Oct 27, 2019 4 min read

It was quite a turnout for the battle of the Century Conference between Washington and McGuffey.

Washington County showed up and it was a pretty cool thing to see.

Arriving an hour and a half before the game, I’m usually one of the first persons in the stadium. Pulling into McGuffey High School, the parking lots were full and the grass areas also were filling up with cars. Half the stands were full an hour before kickoff.

It was quite an atmosphere.

Here are five things we learned the final week of the high school football regular season.

1. Home cooking

Local football teams that will play in the playoffs just didn’t sneak in.

Of the 10 teams to qualify for the postseason, seven will be playing at home in the first round. The only three teams on the road are Canon-McMillan in Class 6A, Charleroi in 2A and California in A.

2. Where will they land?

So what will the the seeds of the 10 local teams look like when the WPIAL holds its pairings meeting tonight in Greentree?

Here is my prediction on a few:

• In Class 2A, Washington will be the top seed. You can make a case for Avonworth but the Prexies haven’t played in a close game all season. Burgettstown will be the third seed. McGuffey could land anywhere from five to seven.
• In Class 5A, I can see the committee bumping Peters Township to the fourth seed. The only setback for the Indians was the loss to Moon, which turns out to be a lot better than everybody thought in the preseason. It will be between Peters Township and Penn Hills for the fourth spot. In the two common opponents, Penn Hills beat North Hills and Baldwin by a combined 27 points. Peters Township beat those same teams by a combined 62 points.

Others that could be interesting is where West Greene will end up? Who will draw Jeannette in the first round? Could rematches be in store if they properly seed Class 4A?

3. Jackson breaks another record

First it was the Greene County all-time career rushing record.

On Friday night, West Greene’s Ben Jackson set a regular-season touchdown record in the WPIAL.

With eight touchdowns in a 59-26 win over Union, Jackson finished the regular season with 47 touchdowns. That topped former Armstrong standout Zane Dudek, who finished a season with 42 scores.

4. Make it eight

How about this for domination?

With South Fayette’s win over Montour Friday night, it was the eighth consecutive season that the Lions finished the conference with an undefeated record.

That will likely lead South Fayette to the second seed in Class 4A, which was its seed last year when it went on to win a WPIAL title.

5. Players of the Week

• Caleb Jackson – The Washington wide receiver did a little bit of everything in a win over McGuffey. Jackson caught a pair of touchdowns and threw a touchdown and two-point conversion.
• Ben Jackson – The eight touchdowns the workhorse running back had were accompanied by 367 rushing yards on 17 carries. He scored five of his touchdowns on runs of 30 yards or longer.
• Jonathan Wolfe – The Jefferson-Morgan running back eclipsed 1,000 yards for the season by running all over Bentworth in a 46-39 win. Wolfe eclipsed 200 yards and scored four touchdowns in the victory.

Staff writer Luke Campbell can be reached at lcampbell@observer-reporter.com.