HS Football Playoffs Week 4
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It was championship weekend in the Lehigh Valley with the District XI 6A title game seen on RCN-TV…
With all of last weekend’s championship games behind us and the start of the Pennsylvania state playoffs commencing this weekend, it’s time to unveil our final District XI polls of the season. But first, here is a look back at our preseason poll (just to see how our experts did with their picks in early August)…
“Big” Schools PRESEASON Poll
1) Emmaus
2) Parkland
2) Freedom
3) Easton
4) Nazareth
“Small” School PRESEASON Poll
2) Palisades
3) Notre Dame
4) Saucon Valley
And now, our FINAL polls…
“Big” Schools Poll
1) Freedom
2) Emmaus
3) Easton
4) Parkland
5) Nazareth
“Small” School Poll
3) Northwestern
4) Notre Dame
ANALYSIS:
Once again our RCN pollsters (a mix of local media members, district administrators and football coaches) did a really good job of giving some insights on which schools would be the top teams this year. Our “Big School” preseason poll had all of the top five teams correctly identified, with just the order of the teams mixed in the final results (a year which included a first-time District XI champion). Parkland also saw its six-year consecutive title run come to an end with a loss in the semifinals to Freedom.
There were more changes in the “small school poll,” with the exception being Bethlehem Catholic holding onto the #1 position from start to finish.
The big surprises were Saucon Valley and Northwestern getting much better play from some of their “unknowns” this season. Senior Tailback Ian Csiszak hardly played offense last year for the Panthers, but became the District’s top rushing back (both in terms of carries and total rushing yards) this fall.
The Tigers got outstanding efforts from a number of different players and won a few more games than many had expected (and two of their losses were by just one point each).
This will also be our final “Pick 4” contest (actually now down to just two Lehigh Valley teams this week.) All season long RCN’s Gary Laubach, Tony Cocca and me teamed with The Morning Call’s Keith Groller and have been weighing-in on games involving the games involving District XI squads. We’ve included a “tiebreaker” because the competition is so close heading into our final week.
| The “PICK 4” |
Pottsgrove vs. Bethlehem Catholic | St. Joe’s vs. Freedom | Total Points Scored Among the 4 Teams: |
| Gary Laubach | Bethlehem Catholic | St. Joe’s | None Given |
| Tony Cocca | Bethlehem Catholic | St. Joe’s | 126 – 1/2 |
| Keith Groller | Bethlehem Catholic | St. Joe’s | 135 |
| Chris Michael | Bethlehem Catholic | St. Joe’s | 139 |
We’ll have the some of the tallies both next week here at “The Shop” and on the following week’s “RCN SportsTalk” program—and unveil which RCN personality will have to partake in doing Fortnite dances LIVE on the air!
In the meantime, have a wonderful Thanksgiving Day holiday!!!
