A-K Valley football teams work to find formula that brings consistent success

By: Michael Love
Sunday, August 18, 2024 | 6:01 AM

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Deer Lakes football has qualified for the WPIAL playoffs four times in its history.

Two of those trips have come in the past two seasons with the team hosting a playoff game for the first time last fall and scoring the program’s first postseason victory with a 30-point rout of visiting Southmoreland.

The Lancers want to make it three in a row, and coach Tim Burk said the pieces are in place for it to happen.

“A lot of it comes down to the kids,” Burk said. “If you have the kids who buy into what you are preaching, and they see the results, that is where it takes off. If you don’t have that good group, things can get off the rails pretty quickly.

“From Day 1, we could see this group coming, even when we were 0-7 (in 2020). There was a group of talent that we felt we could really build around. They bought in and started to see some success. It just took off from there.”

From roster construction to preaching discipline on and off the field, building a consistent winner is a challenge for all coaches but one they take head on each season. Many teams across the A-K Valley have found a formula that works while others continue to develop plans to get on a winning track.

“Right now, we have a roster of 52 kids, which is more than normal for us,” Burk said. “With last year’s success we had, more kids want to be a part of that with the ones who are already here. They see 2,000 or 3,000 people in the stands at a game. They see that excitement, and they learn what it took to create that excitement. It is a feeling the kids don’t want to see go away, and they bond to do whatever they can to keep it that way.”

Burk, like other area coaches, stresses to his players the importance of taking pride in the name on the front of their uniforms and the logo on their helmets.

“Accountability among returning players and those stepping up into new roles is huge in the sense that they don’t want to let the success stop,” Burk said.

“There were never back-to-back playoff years, and we accomplished that with last year’s team. There’s also never been three years in a row, and that is on the table this year. We want to keep that train rolling. We also don’t want it to derail, and I know this group isn’t going to let that happen. I see this group having a lot of success this year. They have put in the work, and the pieces are in place to make it three in a row.

“You’ll probably hear us yell on every play, ‘Do your job.’ They’re one of 11, but if everyone does that, then a play can work. That one play can turn into one series, and that one series can turn into a big quarter or a big half, and then it turns into a big win. It’s a progression from the smallest parts to the biggest success.”

Deer Lakes is fueled by the return of all-conference linebacker Sam Guthrie, 1,000-yard rusher Zier Williams and speedy wideout Zach Grant.

“A lot of it starts by refocusing and getting in the weight room in January,” Guthrie said. “It’s so important to get in there and build bonds and relationships with the guys. We talk about what each rep on each machine is building and the benefits of it will be down the road. That is the same in every weight room for every team, not just ours.

“Everyone was on the same page last year. We shared the same goals. We could see what we had and where we could get to. We had worked too hard to let the opportunity slip away.”

Going for a 4th

Leechburg set a program record last year with its third straight trip to the WPIAL playoffs.

The Blue Devils, before 2021, had a postseason drought that extended back to 1989.

Fifth-year coach Randy Walters said the seeds for the change and the current playoff run were planted in 2020 despite the tough challenges associated with the covid pandemic.

“Those kids, especially the seniors that year, had been through so much already with all the covid madness,” Walters said. “It was tough to gauge what was going on. I was hired in March but wasn’t able to meet them until July 1.

“From Day 1, all I wanted them to do was to work hard, be consistent with routines and make sure to pay attention to details. Kids started to really buy in. We went 3-4, but we lost a heartbreaker by one point to Imani after we had a big lead. We almost had the first winning season since 1991, but we were close, and we could see what was happening was good.”

In 2021, Leechburg broke out to a 9-3 record and a trip to the quarterfinals of the WPIAL Class A playoffs.

“Guys like Tommy Burke, he played receiver and defensive back (in 2020) and then moved to quarterback and really excelled,” Walters said. “Braylan (Lovelace) was a junior and really took off. So many guys were able to come back or come in and build off of the 2020 season. They had a really great offseason and had a great attitude of that year being this team’s opportunity to break through, and they did that. We had success early on and were putting points up. That got things going.”

With a relatively small roster, the Leechburg players were able to come together in 2022 and last year. Under the leadership of players such as senior standouts Jake Cummings, Jayden Floyd and Lucas Gamble, the energy and focus, they hope, is there to extend the school-record playoff streak.

Walters said he feels the formula for maintaining a consistent program is simply doing things right, whether it is in the weight room, on the field, in the classroom or in the community.

“I don’t care if it is going out to the park in Gilpin and doing a landscaping project together or picking weeds in the middle of town or what the guys do with their academics or their work on the field in May or July or even now,” Walters said. “Doing things the right way, even if it isn’t always perfect, leads to that success.”

Floyd, who became only the 17th quarterback in WPIAL history to throw for 1,000 yards and run for 1,000 in a single season, is excited for the opportunity for a fourth playoff trip and to maintain that winning culture.

“Coach Walters has done a great job showing us what it’s going to take, from getting stronger in the weight room to what we do as a team in (on-field) workouts,” Floyd said. “Especially in single-A football, we have 25 to 30 kids, and we all know we have to be ready to step up and be ready to go if they call on any of us. It takes effort and passion for the game. We feel there is a culture of winning established here, and it all comes from having a good work ethic and a willingness to not let anything slide or be done at less than 100%.”

Postseason consistency

The Alle-Kiski Valley record for consecutive playoff seasons is 11 held by Springdale from 2002-12. The Dynamos missed the postseason in 2013 and then made a run from 2014-2017.

Riverview went to eight straight from 1994-2001 and Highlands eight from 1996-2003.

Freeport coach John Gaillot remembers his team’s run of playoff appearances early in his current coaching tenure with the Yellowjackets.

He helped guide teams to the postseason five straight seasons from 2008-12.

“A big thing was staying healthy,” Gaillot said. “There’s always going to be injuries, and you hope you can limit them. Another one is having good depth. Those kind of go hand in hand a lot of the time. We always saw, with the rosters, eight to 10 in each class, and that consistency helped. We didn’t have one real big class and then a much smaller one behind it.

“Within the roster, it’s always key to have kids who might not get on the field as starters be ready to rotate in or go if something happens like an injury. They can also carry that attitude over to the next year when they can get their chance to replace someone who graduates. At a smaller school like we are, you have to have the mindset to use everyone.”

Gaillot said Freeport always has had hard-working kids with a winning attitude, and it showed through during that playoff run.

The Yellowjackets followed that five-year streak with playoff trips in 2015, 2017, 2018 and 2020-22. Gaillot said he was proud of his players who rallied around each other in 2022 when the injury bug bit, especially the linebacking corps.

Key starters such as Jacksen Reiser, Parker Lucas and Colton Otterman eventually returned from their injuries and helped Freeport, the No. 4 seed in Class 3A, make it to the semifinals before running into Belle Vernon at Gateway.

“We always tell the kids that they need to be willing to maybe switch or move positions to help the team,” Gaillot said. “They might not always be excited about doing that, but they agree to it because they want to win.”

Last year, the playoff chase for Freeport came down to the final week, but the Yellowjackets missed out by one game in the standings.

Gaillot said a fresh start with a new conference has his team excited to get back to the playoffs.

“We were young and inexperienced in a lot of areas and had to battle through injuries,” he said.

“We took our lumps, and that can happen to any program. But the kids had the right attitude to come back and work hard in the offseason. I expect any coach to have the same goal of wanting to make the playoffs, going on a run and challenging for a WPIAL championship.”

Camaraderie counts

Highlands, like Leechburg, hopes to earn a berth to the WPIAL playoffs for the fourth year in a row. It met up with perennial WPIAL power Central Valley in the first round last year and fell 28-7. Two years ago, as the No. 6 seed, the Golden Rams were upset by Latrobe, 28-21. In 2021, New Castle bounced Highlands in the first round.

Third-year Golden Rams coach Matt Bonislawski said another playoff trip, and hopefully the taste of a playoff victory, comes down to the simple mantra of teamwork and discipline.

“Our kids have done a phenomenal job with their grades in the classroom, our behavior in school, behavior out of school. Just being a team,” he said. “I always tell people we’ll have the athletes here. We’re not going to be short on athletes. From ninth through the whole way up, they’re there. We have to play together. We can’t fight amongst each other. We have to take care of each other, help each other out.

“That’s the camaraderie that we’ve had and have been building. This is the closest team I’ve seen in the last three years. We’re getting there. We have to work on it every day.”

Bonislawski knows that taking care of business means the team has to take care of itself.

“We don’t worry about who we’re playing. We can’t,” he said. “We have enough going on here. We don’t care who we’re playing. We played Woody High, Mars and beat them. We try to approach every game the same. We worry about ourselves.”

Making a connection

Valley owns the longest playoff drought in the A-K Valley, not having qualified for the postseason since 2015. That is one more than Riverview, which hasn’t been to the playoffs since 2016.

Second-year Vikings coach Mark Adams knows building a program and keeping that consistency comes down to a strong connection to the players.

“We’re not going anywhere unless they believe in what I know,” Adams said. “Learning the connection and getting that relationship with them was key. Sitting down with them in meetings, getting to know them, knowing what’s in their hearts and taking all that into consideration.

“A lot of coaches start with X’s and O’s, but that will only get you so far if you don’t have the pieces of the puzzle to actually draw your plan out. With a relationship you have with a kid who understands you and you understand them, they’ll run through a brick wall for you.”

Adams also points to communication as a key factor.

“You have to be able to communicate,” he said. “And they have to trust that your philosophy is better than anyone else they know. Explaining things to them in their language and letting them understand it for what it is — in their language — is one of the main ingredients.”

Discipline, Adams said, is crucial to developing a player who can help a program achieve consistent success.

“That starts with discipline in the school with the grades, and discipline at home with parents, even before we get on the field,” he said. “If you don’t have it there, you aren’t going to have it here. That discipline has to come first. Then the commitment has to come in from that point. That commitment level says, ‘I’m going to follow through, even when I’m tired, even when I don’t feel like coming down the road to practice.’

“And taking pride in that uniform that you wear and the name that’s on your back. When you guys step on the field, you are representing your parents, you are representing your family and you are representing this town and this community. So, take pride in that.”

Michael Love is a TribLive reporter covering sports in the Alle-Kiski Valley and the eastern suburbs of Pittsburgh. A Clearfield native and a graduate of Westminster (Pa.), he joined the Trib in 2002 after spending five years at the Clearfield Progress. He can be reached at mlove@triblive.com.

Tags: Deer Lakes, Freeport, Highlands, Kiski Area, Leechburg, Valley