Sep 10, 2020 4 min read

The longest, strangest and most trying offseason in local high school football history comes to an end tonight with 13 season-opening games, many of them contests that are expected to loom large in the conference standings by season’s end.

Through the on, then off, then on again summer workouts, finding ways to stay in shape without the benefit of high school weight rooms or practice fields, to following social-distancing guidelines and wearing masks at practices, to questions about whether playing football during a pandemic could, or should, be permitted, to the WPIAL shortening the season to seven weeks with a mid-September start, to spectator limitations because of outdoor gathering restrictions, the athletes have maintained a positive and we-can-do-it attitude in this crazy offseason during which nothing was normal.

With that in mind, perhaps it was fitting that during last week’s scrimmages a local player who is listed as weighing 280 pounds became a bit of an Internet sensation – as a running back.

That player is Washington senior Andre Porter, a senior who is listed as 6-3, 280 pound. The video of Porter’s nimble-footed running and agility in a scrimmage against Jefferson-Morgan made the rounds on Twitter and had him drawing comparisons to former Steelers running back Jerome Bettis.

Porter’s exploits caught the attention of McGuffey coach Ed Dalton, who has been preparing the Highlanders for tonight’s home game against Washington.

“He’s big and athletic,” Dalton said of Porter. “He’s going to be a handful on offense and defense. He can play three different positions on offense.”

Porter, a Boston College recruit as a defensive lineman, will be playing his first game with the Prexies. He transferred to Washington from Ballou High School in Washington, D.C. And when Porter told Prexies head coach Mike Bosnic that he can play running back, at 280 pounds, well, you can guess Bosnic’s response.

“Usually, when linemen say they want to, and can, play running back,” Bosnic said, “it’s not the best idea in the world. But Andre is a really skilled player. He’s a nice athlete.”

As a first-year player for the Prexies, Porter will fit right in. The WPIAL Class 2A runner-up a year ago, Washington was hit hard by graduation and will have many first-year starters at key positions in the showdown against senior-laden McGuffey.

“We really don’t know what to expect from them,” Dalton said. “We know their quarterback is athletic and their line will be good because Mike is a terrific line coach, but we really don’t know what kind of offense they will run.”

Washington knows what to expect from McGuffey’s offense. The Highlanders, who run the flexbone, averaged 39.8 points per game a year ago and have nine returning starters on offense.

“Going into a game with so many first-time starters is always a concern,” Bosnic admitted. “With McGuffey’s offense, you have to be disciplined. You can’t overpursue. Playing against a team that runs the option is even more of a challenge for a defense in the first game of the season.”

In each of the last two years, the Wash High-McGuffey game has been played at the end of the season and has had at least a share of first place in the Century Conference going to the winner. Washington won each of those games. When the WPIAL announced in late July that it was shortening the football season to seven weeks, it also moved up all Oct. 30 games to Sept. 11.

In addition to Washington-McGuffey, other rivalry games being played tonight include Jefferson-Morgan at Carmichaels, Fort Cherry at Burgettstown and Ringgold at Trinity.

Dalton said he likes the idea of opening the season against Washington.

“In a COVID season, I think it’s great that it’s the first game,” he said. “I don’t know if the WPIAL purposely scheduled this way, but it had games between big rivals scheduled for the last week of the season. Moving those games to the first week, it gives all of us our really big rival. And if something would happen later in the season that would cause games to not be played, then those rivalry games will have been played. Those games are important to communities.”

One team that will not be playing tonight is Peters Township. The Indians, who were the WPIAL Class 5A runnerup a year ago and have two Division I recruits on defense, were to host South Fayette in an Allegheny Six Conference contest. That game was postponed because of COVID-19 situations in the Peters Township School District.

South Fayette will instead play tonight at Dover (Ohio) and its game against Peters Township has been rescheduled for Sept. 25.