Defense, special teams carries Mt. Lebanon past NA, into 1st WPIAL title game since 2000

By: Kevin Lohman
Friday, November 12, 2021 | 11:40 PM

For the first time since 2000, Mt. Lebanon is headed to the WPIAL championship.

No. 1 Mt. Lebanon (11-0) got on the board first and refused to relinquish its lead during a 28-17 victory over No.4 North Allegheny (7-5) to punch its ticket to the Class 6A finals and snap a title-game drought that lasted more than two decades.

While Blue Devils head Bob Palko has already been to the WPIAL football mountaintop as an eight-time winner at West Allegheny, the significance of the moment for the program he currently leads was certainly not lost on him.

“I would tell you, watching the excitement as the year built up and went on, people here could feel that things building up to this point. The program has done well since then, too — don’t get me wrong,” Palko said.

“It’s just a proud community, a proud town. You can see how important football is for everyone here. The players are excited. We have alumni excited. We’re just honored to be a part of the tradition, and we’re going to get ourselves ready to rock and roll next week.”

Mt. Lebanon’s Eli Heidenreich set the tone early, picking off a North Allegheny pass on the third play of the game and taking it 33 yards for a touchdown and a 7-0 lead.

The versatile senior was a problem for the visiting Tigers throughout, as Heidenreich brought a punt back 41 yards for a special teams touchdown. He also rushed for 80 yards on 12 carries.

“I don’t think there’s been a game since he’s played offense full-time where he hasn’t scored a touchdown. So that’s every game his junior and senior year where he’s scored a touchdown. And he’s done it in all kinds of different ways,” Palko said.

“But he’ll be the first to tell you, he can’t do that stuff alone. These guys are tight-knit, and they got it done together. One thing I’ve learned in my years as a head coach is you learn as much from the kids as they do from you.”

Quarterback Joey Daniels scored for the Blue Devils on a 31-yard run before exiting at halftime with an injury. Mt. Lebanon’s Connor Young also found his way into the end zone in the first half, returning a fumble 26 yards to give his team a 28-17 team lead that remained unchanged.

Mt. Lebanon running back Alex Tecza rushed for a game-high 121 yards.

The loss for North Allegheny marks its second to the Blue Devils this season. This time, however, the Tigers refused to let the gap between the two teams widen.

In the end, coach Art Walker’s team only surrendered one touchdown from a Blue Devils’ offense that was averaging 37.4 points per game. Though North Allegheny still fell short of its goal of returning to the WPIAL 6A championship game, the team’s performance was far from an overall failure, according to its coach.

“They scored twice on defense and once on special teams. That’s the difference in the ball game,” Walker said.

“I thought our defense played great. We talk about Daniels and Heidenreich and Tecza and the other guys on their team — who else has held them to seven points? We couldn’t put things together offensively or score when we needed to. You can’t do that against good football teams, and that’s a good football team.”

Andrew Gavlik accrued most of the damage for the North Allegheny offense, amassing 60 yards and two rushing scores on 10 carries. Harron Lee booted a 24-yard field goal.

Mt. Lebanon will face Central Catholic in the championship game at 7 p.m. Nov. 20 at Norwin.

Watch an archived broadcast of this game on Trib HSSN.

Tags: Mt. lebanon, North Allegheny