Nov 3, 2002 By Rob Burchianti 6 min read

SAXONBURG – Uniontown football coach John Fortugna could only ponder about what might have been when he tried to size up his Red Raiders’ 34-7 defeat to Knoch in their WPIAL first-round playoff game at Knoch Knights Stadium on Friday night. “We just needed a little better execution at some key times,” Fortugna said. “You look up at the score and it says 34-7, but I thought our kids played hard. Our offensive line played well and we did a lot of good things tonight.

“We just didn’t take advantage of the opportunities we had.”

Dusty Ziacik rushed for 121 yards to go over 1,000 for the season and scored three touchdowns as the fifth-seeded Knights (9-1) advanced to the Class AAA quarterfinals where they will play fourth-seeded Hopewell. Ziacik now has 1,048 yards and 16 touchdowns.

The 12th-seeded Red Raiders, making their third consecutive playoff appearance, ended the season at 6-4.

Uniontown got Knoch’s attention right from the start when Guthrie scored on a one-yard quarterback sneak to cap an impressive 10-play, 64-yard drive. Kellen Lieb’s extra-point kick gave the Red Raiders a 7-0 lead. Key plays in the scoring march were Todd Jackson’s 11-yard run and Guthrie’s 35-yard pass to Junior Mayes to the Knoch three-yard line on third and seven.

“We knew they were going to run the ball, but they lull you in to stopping the run and then they hit that big pass play,” Knights coach Mike King said.

Knoch answered quickly, thanks to a 43-yard kickoff return by Nick Novotny to the Uniontown 41. Fullback Kit Durrett, who rushed for 83 yards, picked up 22 on the Knights’ first play from scrimmage, which eventually led to Ziacik’s one-yard TD run with 2:30 left in the opening period. Mark Klabnik’s extra-point boot knotted the score at 7-7.

“We needed to get off to a good start and we did, but then they got a great, great kickoff return against us, and that sort of sparked them a little bit,” Fortugna said.

Uniontown’s second possession stalled at its own 37, but that led to the turning point of the game when Chris Petruska went back to punt on fourth down.

Fortugna made a brilliant call with a fake punt that caught the Knights off guard. The snap went to Guthrie, the up man, instead of Petruska, but junior quarterback’s pass to a wide open Matt Ciampanelli was over thrown and fell incomplete. Instead of a first down and a possible touchdown, Uniontown turned the ball over on downs.

“It’s a playoff game, so you’ve got to try some things,” Fortugna said. “It was probably a bad call at that time on my part, though. It gave them the ball in good position.”

King disagreed.

“That was a nice call by them, it really was,” King said. “You get in these playoff situations and you’ve got to take some chances.”

The Uniontown defense stiffened after giving up one first down, but Klabnik booted a 31-yard field goal on the third play of the second quarter to put Knoch in front to stay, 10-7.

The Knights stretched the lead to 24-7 by halftime on Mark Rupert’s eight-yard touchdown pass to tight end Matt Koren and Ziacik’s two-yard scoring run, the latter coming with 27 seconds left in quarter.

Rupert completed eight of 15 passes without an interception for 120 yards.

Klabnik added another field goal, this one from 26 yards out, in the third quarter to make it 27-7, but Uniontown wasn’t done yet.

Guthrie started an 11-play drive when he completed a nine-yard pass to Mayes. Four plays later Bill McLee turned in the play of the game with a rumbling 21-yard run in which he broke several tackles with three Knight players finally dragging the junior running back down at the Knoch 42. Uniontown eventually moved to the 30.

Guthrie did his best to make up for his errant fake-punt pass, but this time his teammates failed him. Guthrie made perfect throws on two consecutive plays, only to watch the Red Raiders drop both of them and blow a chance to pull within 27-14 early in the fourth quarter.

Knoch sacked Guthrie on fourth down, then moved 65 yards in six plays with Ziacik scoring the game’s final touchdown on a 19-yard run with 7:23 left.

“We gave up too many big plays on defense and didn’t make enough of them on offense,” McLee said. “That was the ball game.”

McLee led the Red Raiders with 14 carries for 62 yards to push his season total up to 835. Todd Jackson returned a pair of kickoffs for 66 yards and Matt Smiley ran four back for 74 yard to lead Uniontown’s special teams. Defensive back Eric Hughes played an exceptional game on defense. Hughes broke up a long pass and recorded two tackles for losses, one on Rupert and one on Novotny to foil a reverse, in the third quarter alone to help keep the Red Raiders in the game.

Fortugna commended his senior class after the game.

“They were the ones who started it all. This is their third time in the playoffs,” Fortugna said. “Whatever I asked of them, it was done. They showed good leadership.

“I feel sorry for them because I couldn’t get them a playoff win or a WPIAL championship, because they deserved it.”

Seniors Harry Kaufman and Adam Muzika looked back on their Red Raider careers with fondness.

“It’s been a great run for us,” Kaufman said. “I think the program has gotten to the point where we’re expected to make the playoffs now.”

“It’s disappointing to have it end this way,” Muzika said. “It’s very unfulfilling right now. My solace is how far we’ve come in four years. Me, Harry and Mike (Lengvarsky) played when we were freshman and we won two games. Now we’ve won 20 in these last three years and made the playoffs each season. I think this class really helped turn it around.

“But don’t worry about these guys,” Muzika added, waving his hand in reference to the Red Raider underclassmen. “They’ll be back next year. They’ll keep the tradition going.”