WPIAL SPORTS 2009 YEAR IN REVIEW

WPIAL Year in Review - Top 25 Stories of 2009: 25 through 21
12/27/2009 - Don Rebel
The year 2009 in high school sports in the WPIAL had some great highs and some sad lows. It was a year where familiar champions were crowned again while some title runs came to an end. There were champions and then there were perfect champions. We said hello to some new teams, some new winners and a new sport while we said goodbye to some outstanding athletes and some winning coaches. Here are the Top 25 stories from around the WPIAL starting with #25 through #21.

#25 - WPIAL WELCOMES BOYS LACROSSE

Back in 2003, lacrosse officially became a WPIAL sanctioned sport, however only for the girls. Mount Lebanon and Peters Township have dominated the girl’s lacrosse title picture winning three golden crowns each. This past spring, the WPIAL rolled out the red carpet for the boys.

28 boy’s teams from the district participated this past spring, 14 in Division I and 14 in Division II.

May 22nd was an historic night at Martorelli Stadium in West View as the WPIAL conducted its first championships in boys lacrosse following the first season the sport was sanctioned by the district. Mount Lebanon in Division I and Hampton in Division II were crowned the inaugural district champions.

#24 - WPIAL NEARLY SWEEPS PIAA GOLF

West Allegheny sophomore Garrett Browning bounced back from a third place finish in the WPIAL championships to capture the 2009 PIAA Boys Golf Championship in October at the Heritage Hills Golf Resort in York. It was a banner day for the WPIAL as not only did Brown win the boys individual crown, but a pair of district squads won PIAA team titles.

Latrobe, led by WPIAL boy’s individual winner Ben Gjebre won the boys team title while Shady Side Academy captured gold in the girl’s team championships.

Miranda Santucci of Winchester Thurston had the highest finish from the WPIAL in the PIAA girl’s individual championship when she shot a two day total of 156 to finish tied for third place.

#23 - COACHING EXODUS AT JEANNETTE HIGH SCHOOL

For a few years, Ray Reitz and Jim Nesser were reeling in the gold as football and boys basketball coach at Jeannette High School. In 2009, both coaches left the Jayhawks for Class AAAA schools.

After four successful years as head coach of the Jeannette Jayhawks, Ray Reitz moved further east down Route 30 after being named the new football coach of the Latrobe Wildcats in January. Reitz, a 1974 graduate of Jeannette High School, was 48-6 in his four years at Jeannette, including two WPIAL championships and one PIAA state title. The 52-year old Reitz takes over for Pat Murray, who resigned as coach of the Wildcats in November after a 3-7 season. Latrobe was 37-63 in ten years under Murray.

In June, a month after the controversial firing of Bill Swan as boy’s basketball coach at Hempfield, school officials hired Jim Nesser away from Jeannette High School. Nesser was an impressive 72-14 in his three year stint at Jeannette, including a WPIAL and PIAA basketball championship in the 2007-2008 season. Nesser also coached at Elizabeth Forward, Southmoreland and Yough, as well as a stint as coach at Penn State-McKeesport. Hempfield finished 13-8 overall this past winter and qualified for second place out of Class AAAA Section 1. While the Spartans made the district playoffs in each of the past four years, they have lost their last five postseason games.

#22 - MATT CLEMENT: FROM MLB TO BUTLER BOYS HOOPS

I June, the Butler school board approved the hiring of former major league pitcher Matt Clement as the new boys basketball coach. Clement beat out two other legendary coaches for the job. Center High School and former Butler hoops coach Mark Jula and District 10 coach Bill Hager of Franklin High School.

Clement played in major league baseball for 16 seasons before finally hanging up the cleats. He had spoken of hoping to get the opportunity to coach at his alma-mater someday.

Clement was the starting point guard for the 1991 WPIAL championship basketball team coached by Mark Jula. He was offered a scholarship to play at Lafayette but was discovered unexpectedly by a major league scout when he was pitching for Golden Tornado baseball team. Clement only
threw 11 innings his senior year.

Clement first love was basketball in high school. He gives Mark Jula a lot of credit for his baseball career because he was in such great shape in high school from basketball and he created a great work ethic to succeed.

Clement took over a Butler program that only made the playoffs once this decade.

#21 - CINDERELLA HEMPFIELD GOLDEN IN SOFTBALL TITLE RUN

One of the more surprising championship runs in 2009 took place in the WPIAL Class AAAA softball playoffs.

To say that Hempfield was flying under the radar coming into the 2009 WPIAL Softball Playoffs would be an understatement. They finished in third place in their section and were seeded 9th out of a 12-team Class AAAA postseason field.

Whatever button that Coach Bob Kalp and his Spartans pressed at the start of the playoffs, you can color it gold after Hempfield captured a district softball championship for the first time in eleven years and for only the second time in school history with a thrilling 3-2 win over Shaler in the district title game.

The Spartans trip on Upset Boulevard included knocking off four straight higher-seeds en route to the Class AAAA softball title, including 8th-seed Peters Township, top-seed North Allegheny, 4th-seed Connellsville and 6th-seed Shaler.