Chris Harlan stories, Page 53

No. 1 Quaker Valley vs. No. 2 Montour 9 p.m. Thursday, Petersen Events Center On the air: Livestream: TribHSSN.TribLive.com; Radio: 1230 AM, 99.3 FM, 1460 AM WPIAL titles: Quaker Valley 1 (1997); Montour 2 (2011, ’13) Quaker Valley (22-0) Coach: Mike Mastroianni 3, Adou Thiero, 6-6, sr., G 4 Will...

North Hills senior Alex Smith and his older brother Nick have a strong sibling rivalry that carries over to the basketball court. Here’s a debate they just can’t seem to finish: Whose high school team was better, Alex’s or Nick’s? The younger brother hopes to have the last word in...

Mt. Lebanon is notorious for consuming clock with long possessions, but when the Blue Devils did so Tuesday night, it was often because they found no easy route to the rim. No. 1 seed North Hills leaned on a stout half-court defense, allowed only three points in the first quarter...

Fourteen players from the WPIAL were selected Tuesday for the Big 33 Football Classic, including four from Mt. Lebanon’s state championship team and two from Penn-Trafford. Mt. Lebanon quarterback Joey Daniels, running back Alex Tecza, wide receiver Eli Heidenreich and defensive tackle William Harvey were picked for the May 30...

The road to the WPIAL championship winds through gyms all across Western Pennsylvania, but New Castle rarely gets lost along the way. They know the route better than most. “This is the road we take every year,” senior Mike Wells said Monday night, after the Red Hurricanes clinched their eighth...

As the hockey schedule reached late February, North Allegheny’s Connor Chi pushed his season-long scoring streak to 19 games. The senior recorded at least one goal or assist in every contest, cementing his spot as an elite scorer. But this winter, he’s had help. North Allegheny clinched the top spot...

Adou Thiero wore tape on the knee he injured last winter and a wrap on the thumb he fractured earlier this week. His junior season was cut short by one injury, costing his team a chance at a WPIAL title, so the Quaker Valley star was determined that this season...

Upper St. Clair freshman Rylee Kalocay didn’t start Saturday’s semifinal, but she certainly finished it. Kalocay scored her team’s final nine points including a tying 3-pointer, a go-ahead runner with 3.2 seconds left and two free throws with seven-tenths on the clock. Combined, that let No. 3 seed Upper St....

As the saying goes, it’s tough to beat a basketball team three times in one season, but what about four? The sold-out crowd that packed into North Hills’ gym was there to find out. Indians sophomore Royce Parham scored 24 points, senior Alex Smith had 21, and No. 1 seed...

Game officials imposed a two-game suspension on Ellwood City boys basketball coach Steve Antuono for unsportsmanlike actions during a chaotic ending to Thursday night’s playoff loss. Antuono confronted officials and others and was assessed a “supplemental disqualification” after the top-seeded Wolverines were upset by No. 8 Avonworth, 66-55, in a...

Gateway was only a couple of minute away from upsetting No. 3 seed Mars, but for the Gators, those final moments seemed to last forever. This was a big moment for a team that hasn’t reached the WPIAL semifinals in a decade. “That last two minutes felt like an hour,”...

The WPIAL tried a new approach for scheduling nonconference football games this year by giving teams a say in who they play. Teams also got to say who they won’t play. Schools were surveyed this winter and asked to list five nonconference opponents they would prefer to face next fall...

The WPIAL has scheduled three basketball semifinals at Robert Morris’ UPMC Events Center on Saturday starting with top-seeded Quaker Valley facing defending champion Lincoln Park in a Class 4A boys game at noon. They’re followed by two Class 6A girls semifinals. At 2 p.m., North Allegheny plays Upper St. Clair,...

Sharing the court with a couple of scorers bound for Division I colleges might make some freshmen timid. Not Lincoln Park’s Meleek Thomas, who waved for the basketball when the Leopards needed a fourth-quarter boost Wednesday night. And without hesitation, they passed it to him. Thomas missed much of this...

Butler intends to take legal action after the PIAA upheld a decision banning the football team from the District 10 playoffs, said the school’s athletic director. The PIAA board on Wednesday heard a nearly hour-long appeal from Butler and voted unanimously to sustain an earlier WPIAL ruling that made the...

Say goodbye to flying Hershey’s Kisses and giant chocolate bars. Pennsylvania high school athletes will have to find a new way to celebrate trips to the state championships. The PIAA board voted Wednesday to move the football and soccer championships to Cumberland Valley’s Chapman Field for at least the next...

Tuesday marked the playoff opener for the North Allegheny boys, but the Tigers felt they’d already had a postseason mindset for a while now. For that, they credit life in Section 1. So, when the postseason officially arrived, senior Matt McDonough made four 3-pointers in the first quarter, the team’s...

Steel Valley’s Makhai Valentine wears No. 1 and teammate Cruce Brookins is No. 2, fitting for a combination that delivered a knockout punch Monday night. Fourth-seeded Seton LaSalle was the heavyweight that fell. Brookins scored 30 points, Valentine had 23 and No. 13 seed Steel Valley pulled off a first-round...

The WPIAL has suspended a former Greensburg Central Catholic assistant football coach for violating PIAA rules against recruiting. Shane Goydich is banned from coaching at any PIAA school for one year for attempting to “influence or persuade one or more students to enroll in Greensburg Central Catholic,” WPIAL executive director...

Ayden Owens felt the sunshine of Southern California and the cold of Ann Arbor, Mich., in his first three years of college. Nowadays, you’ll find the former North Allegheny star breaking track and field records down south in Fayetteville, Ark. He knows that may surprise some. “I’ve taken a crazy...

When Matthew White was a little kid, he enjoyed going to high school basketball games and seeing the officials, because his grandfather was one of them. “From when I was very young, I have memories of him taking me with his partners back to the locker room and then going...

The WPIAL basketball committee had a question for playoff teams: “What have you done for me lately?” The Montour boys, the Aliquippa boys and a number of other qualifiers with strong regular-season finishes had the right answer. They received a bump to higher seeds Monday night when the WPIAL revealed...

Class 6A Favorite: North Hills went undefeated and ran away with the Section 1 title, putting the Indians in position to maybe win their first WPIAL title. They’re led by a trio of double-digit scorers, including 6-foot-7 sophomore Royce Parham (20.9 ppg) and 6-3 senior guards Alex Smith (18.6) and...

Laurel Highlands or New Castle? Mt. Lebanon or North Allegheny? Most No. 1 seeds were easy choices, but the WPIAL basketball committee was divided on a couple of others, said chairman Bill Cardone, whose committee met for nearly three hours Monday. The No. 1 seeds in Class 5A boys and...

Cole Young has a Twitter account, so the North Allegheny senior usually notices whenever someone publishes a new MLB mock draft or an updated list of high school baseball prospects. His name gets mentioned often nowadays. “It’s always fun reading it to see what some people say,” said Young, a...