The Tyrone Golden Eagles have a chance to make history tomorrow when they visit Central at Roaring Spring Athletic Field.
\nA win would give the 8-0 Eagles (5-0 Nittany Division) an undefeated regular season, which in itself is nothing new under coach John Franco, who has guided Tyrone teams to five unbeaten regular seasons since 1996. It would also be the third time Tyrone has registered back-to-back unbeaten seasons under Franco.
\nBut never before at Tyrone, with Franco in charge or any other coach for that matter, has a team gone three straight seasons without a loss, and that\u2019s what the Golden Eagles have an opportunity to do against the Scarlet Dragons.
\nThat\u2019s something Franco mentioned to his players this week, but in reality it\u2019s the least of the pragmatic coach\u2019s concerns. Instead, concern No. 1 has nothing to do with records or securing the team\u2019s fourth-straight MAC Nittany Division championship, and everything to do with the playoffs. A win would assure Tyrone the top seed and home field advantage in the District 5-6 Class AA playoffs, which start in two weeks.
\n\u201cThree undefeated seasons is something that\u2019s never happened at our school before and something that rarely happens at all in high school,\u201d Franco said. \u201cBut our big thing is to reach one of our goals, and that\u2019s to get a one or two seed in the playoffs. Another goal is to win a District championship, so this game is very important.\u201d
\nThe Eagles\u2019 margin for error in qualifying for the postseason was magnified when Johnstown reneged on a two-year contract it had signed with Tyrone before the 2006 season. Tyrone could have tried to schedule a Week 10 game with a Class A school that failed to qualify for the playoffs, but under the District\u2019s new scoring system, such a move would have worked against the Eagles.
\n\u201cThis year, because not everyone could schedule a Week 10 game, they go by points per game,\u201d Franco said. \u201cAt the end of the season, they divide the number of games you\u2019ve played into your total points, so if we pick up a game against a Single-A team that has only two wins, it actually knocks us down in points per game.\u201d
\nThe best decision, in Franco\u2019s eyes, was to end the regular season in Week 9 and use Week 10 to heal up for a postseason run. He would feel a lot better if his team could spend Week 10 as the last remaining undefeated team in Class AA.
\nBut it won\u2019t come easy. The Dragons, though just 2-6 (1-4 Nittany Division), have shown the ability to score points in bunches \u2013 as demonstrated in a 48-27 loss to Philipsburg-Osceola last week \u2013 and they\u2019re led by one of the top passers in the Nittany Division in Chris Kurtz.
\nStanding just 5-foot-6, Kurtz has completed 105 of 163 passes (64.4 percent) for 1,305 yards and 9 touchdowns. He leads the Dragons with 7 touchdowns, and he\u2019s second on the team with 195 rushing yards on 95 carries.
\n\u201cHe\u2019s a special kid,\u201d said Central coach A.J. Hoenstine. \u201cHe\u2019s only five-six, 145, but he plays like he\u2019s six-three, 210. We rely on him to do a lot, and he makes things happen with his arm and his feet.\u201d
\nAfter watching three of Central\u2019s games on film, Franco was impressed with Kurtz\u2019s playmaking ability.
\n\u201cHe puts the ball on the money and finds the open receiver,\u201d Franco said. \u201cHe\u2019s got a knack for playing the game. He\u2019s very quick, and he can make all of the throws \u2013 he can throw the deep ball, the fade, the intermediate routes, and he has nice touch on the short stuff.\u201d
\nAgainst the Mounties, a game the Dragons trailed just 27-21 heading into the fourth quarter, Kurtz completed 30 of 46 passes for 298 yards and three touchdowns.
\nBut the problem for the Dragons was similar to what they\u2019ve encountered all year. With nine underclassmen starting, Central\u2019s defense has come along at a much slower rate than its offense. The Dragons are allowing 22.4 points per game, and have surrendered more than 25 four times.
\nStill, Hoenstine said, the Dragons will enter tomorrow\u2019s game with every intention of stopping Tyrone\u2019s running game, led by senior Shayne Tate.
\n\u201cWe have to stop Tate if we want to have any chance of winning,\u201d Hoenstine said. \u201cThat\u2019s easier said than done. He\u2019s stepped in nicely, and it\u2019s like I told our kids this week: that\u2019s Tyrone football. No matter who\u2019s in there, they\u2019re going to play hard.\u201d
\nIn his stint as Tyrone\u2019s starting tailback, Tate\u2019s story is similar to the castaways on Gilligan\u2019s Island \u2013 his tour of duty was never intended to be this long. When senior Johnny Franco went down in the preseason with a leg injury, it was thought Tate would simply fill in until last season\u2019s leading rusher was healthy enough to return.
\nEight games and 1,293 yards later, Tate\u2019s season has him among the top 10 best single-season rushers in school history. He\u2019s also thrown for a touchdown pass and caught four passes for 40 yards.
\nBut the key for Tyrone since mid-season has been the emergence of skill players to complement Tate. Shane Emigh leads the team in receptions with 17 catches for 258 yards, while tight end Johnny Shaffer has caught 10 passes for 123 yards.
\nPerhaps most importantly, sophomore quarterback Levi Reihart has evolved into a solid starter, completing 47 of 87 passes for 590 yards and three touchdowns. Since his breakout game against Bald Eagle Area in Week 4, when he threw for over 100 yards and his first varsity touchdown pass, Tyrone is averaging 25.8 points per game.
\n\u201cWe\u2019ve worked very hard on our offense,\u201d Franco said. \u201cNot many teams have to replace nine starters, but we did, and when you thrown in a sophomore quarterback, it takes a little bit longer. But our offensive line has done a great job, and we\u2019ll be as good as they are.\u201d
\nThe line may have never been better than it was last week in Tyrone\u2019s 24-21 win over Class AAA contender Indian Valley, when it paved the way for the Eagles to run for 228 yards, part of 359 yards of total offense. Tate ran for over 200 yards for the third time this season, and the offense ground out two time-consuming drives in the second half that didn\u2019t amount to points, but kept the Warriors\u2019 high-scoring offense off the field.
\n\u201cTyrone has the mentality to win every game,\u201d Hoenstine said. \u201cThe other team might have more yards, but they always seem to find a way to twin. They don\u2019t beat themselves.\u201d
\nDespite the different directions both teams are headed this season \u2013 Tyrone to the playoffs, Central to an early off-season \u2013 Hoenstine said his team will \u201cbattle\u201d against the Eagles. Franco said he expected nothing less.
\n\u201cOur kids are excited to play on their Senior Night,\u201d said Hoenstine.
\n\u201cWhen you look at our schedule, there\u2019s no team we can\u2019t beat, but there\u2019s also no team that can\u2019t beat us,\u201d Franco said. \u201cThe second you think you can just show up and win is when you lose.\u201d
\nRenewing the Rivalry
\nTyrone and Central haven\u2019t played since 2000, but the game was once one of the top rivalries on the Eagles\u2019 schedule, particularly in the mid- to late-1990s.
\nTyrone won the final seven games of the 30-game series, but the contest was often the game-of-the-year in the defunct Big 8, like in 1996 and 1997, when both teams went into the game with unbeaten conference records.
\nCentral left the Big 8 in 2000 to join the Laurel Highlands Conference, a move with sweeping effects for the Big 8, which soon broke up and was reformed into the MAC in 2004.
\nCentral\u2019s last win over Tyrone was in 1993 \u2013 Hoenstine\u2019s senior season \u2013 when the Dragon\u2019s beat Tyrone 31-7 at Gray Memorial Field.
\n\u201cWe told the kids about that this week,\u201d Hoenstine said of the series history. \u201cThere was a time when we were the big team, and it was a pretty big rivalry. It was always a battle, and we look forward to another battle Friday.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
The Tyrone Golden Eagles have a chance to make history tomorrow when they visit Central at Roaring Spring Athletic Field. A win would give the 8-0 Eagles (5-0 Nittany Division) an undefeated regular season, which in itself is nothing new under coach John Franco, who has guided Tyrone teams to five unbeaten regular seasons since […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4,7],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2898","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-sports-news-in-the-tyrone-pennsylvania-area","category-excerpts-from-the-tyrone-daily-herald"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/tyronepa.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2898","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/tyronepa.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/tyronepa.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tyronepa.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tyronepa.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=2898"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/tyronepa.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2898\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/tyronepa.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=2898"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tyronepa.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=2898"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tyronepa.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=2898"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}