When McKeesport and Thomas Jefferson met in early September during the regular season, there was one key component missing from their spirited rivalry.
The Jaguars won, but both teams knew that the absence of five-star superstar Kemon Spell, who left the game after three carries due to a nagging ankle injury, played a big part in the result.
What a difference one player can make.
When the teams ran it back Friday night with a trip to the WPIAL Class 4A championship game on the line, Spell carried the No. 1 Tigers (9-3) to a 28-3 victory over the No. 4 Jaguars (9-3) to push them to their third straight district title game.
The No. 1 running back recruit in the country finished the game with 331 yards and three TDs on 17 rushes after taking nine carries for 232 yards and two scores in the first half alone. Spell had a 97-yard touchdown and a 72-yard scamper to end the first half, also adding an interception on defense.
“This performance tonight was next level,” McKeesport coach Matt Miller said of Spell. “This is what we know he can do. He was exceptional on both sides of the ball. I mean, he had an interception, and he puts a lot of fear in people in the return game.”
Thomas Jefferson’s Sam Wessel, who registered the only three points of the game for his squad on a 26-yard field goal in the third quarter, punted away from Spell all night, sending most of his efforts out of bounds.
For TJ coach Bill Cherpak, there wasn’t much to say about the loss outside of praising Spell’s play and sharing some frustrations regarding costly turnovers. Sophomore quarterback Harrison Kolling has gotten better as the season progressed, but he threw three interceptions inside the McKeesport 10 in the loss.
“The thing about it is, we were in good positions,” Cherpak said. “It is what it is. He’s a great player, but we certainly made him look like Superman. You’ve got to give them credit because they’re physical and they have athletes everywhere. They just made a lot of plays and made us make some bad plays.
“With that being said, you can’t have two picks on the 1-yard line. You can’t drop a pass at the 1-yard line. There’s just so many things where we could have kept ourselves in the game, but we didn’t do them.”
Despite the difficult night, the Jaguars are excited about Kolling’s development moving forward.
“He just got flustered really quickly,” Cherpak said. “Nothing against some of the other teams that we played, but the windows are open a lot longer than they were tonight. When you play McKeesport, the windows close quickly, and you have to deliver or they’re gonna pick it.
“A couple of them weren’t the best decisions. But he’s a sophomore; we have confidence in him and he’s going to get better.”
After a few consecutive losses to TJ, including in last year’s WPIAL championship game, it’s the Tigers moving on to face No. 7 Aliquippa.
“Who cares about who you play? You just want to keep playing,” Miller said. “It was going to be them or New Castle, and it seemed like they’re kind of mirror-image teams. We’ll enjoy this tonight, and then it’s back to work tomorrow.”
After both teams failed to score, the Tigers got the ball at the TJ 47 and took advantage of the great field position.
Spell started to break free with a 22-yard carry and a 16-yard run, setting up his first score of the night from 6 yards out. After Wyatt Heasley’s extra point, the score read 7-0 in favor of McKeesport with 6:40 remaining in the first.
That ended the first-quarter scoring, but the Jaguars started to find their rhythm on the last drive of the first.
Tyler Eber, who paced TJ with 98 rushing yards on 30 carries, broke his longest one of the night for a 25-yard gain before the Jaguars converted a fourth-and-6 with a 14-yard screen pass to Dom Volomino.
From there, the Jaguars opted for some wildcat with Eber and worked it deep into McKeesport territory before Javien Robinson came up with his first of two interceptions, flipping the game on its head as quarterback Matthew Miller snuck forward for 2 yards and Spell followed that up with a 97-yard touchdown run.
“Those picks were huge for us, and I attribute that to all the film he’s been watching,” Miller said of Robinson. “He was telling me, ‘I knew they were doing this and that,’ so it was really good to hear him evolve from a great athlete to a great football player with high IQ.”
Spell’s long run made it 14-0 with 8:29 left in the first half.
With 5:25 left in the second quarter, TJ was still trailing 14-0 but went on another strong drive deep into McKeesport territory when Kolling was again picked off. Looking for Kane Eggerton, his pass sailed a bit too far for him as Spell ranged over to his left and made the grab to give the ball back to the Tigers.
After the halftime break, another long TJ drive culminated in Wessel’s kick, ending their scoring for the night. Meanwhile, the victors had two long touchdown runs in the fourth to ice the game as Spell rattled off a 55-yard touchdown with 10:10 left and Akeem Cochran, who only got one carry on the night, took a pitch 59 yards to the house to make it 28-3.
“I told Akeem, ‘Tonight’s not gonna be your night. You might not get any carries,’” Miller said. “I told him and (Javier Everett), ‘Hey, this is about the team,’ and they both embraced it. Then, late in the game, we were just running our stuff and he was able to break one. It wasn’t intentional.”
The Tigers are hoping to run their stuff well enough for at least one more victory over Aliquippa next Saturday at Pine-Richland for all the marbles.