Oct 23, 2015 4 min read

WEST MIFFLIN – Because of two bizarre turnovers and West Mifflin’s two aces – quarterback Karlen Garner and tailback Howard Reid – Trinity might be in need of a wild card to make the WPIAL football playoffs.

Garner, an athletic option quarterback, ran for two touchdowns and passed for another, and Reid rushed for 152 yards and one score, and Tyler Beck booted a pivotal 27-yard field goal in the fourth quarter as West Mifflin held off hard-charging Trinity 29-27 in a key Big 10 Conference game Friday night.

The loss for Trinity (4-4, 4-4) leaves the Hillers tied with Laurel Highlands for fifth place in the conference with one week left in the regular season. The top five teams in each conference automatically make the WPIAL playoffs in Class AAA, along with a wild-card finisher from among the three six-place finishers. Laurel Highlands already has a win over Trinity, so the Hillers will need to beat Ringgold in the regular-season finale and get some help to avoid falling into the complicated wild-card scenario.

The Hillers had a good chance to move ahead of LH, which lost to conference leader Belle Vernon, but they couldn’t overcome two costly sequences against West Mifflin (6-2, 6-2). Trailing 12-7 with less than three minutes remaining in the first half, Trinity drove to the West Mifflin two-yard line. A fumble that the Hillers recovered left them with fourth-and-goal back at the five.

Head coach Jon Miller opted to forgo a field goal and went instead for a go-ahead touchdown. Quarterback Dylan Kern’s pass was deflected and snatched out of the air by West Mifflin’s Dylan Boytos, who returned it to the Titans’ 42-yard line.

Those three points would have come in handy for Trinity late in the game.

“Our kids played their tails off until the end,” Miller said. “We didn’t have one bounce go our way the entire game, and you need a few of those. That decision not to kick the field goal in the second quarter was one me. We should have kicked the field goal.”

Two plays after the interception, Reid raced 58 yards up the middle to give West Mifflin a 19-7 lead with 2:38 left in the half.

The speedy Reid, who was shot in the foot during the summer and didn’t begin practicing until the second week of the season, was making only his second start.

“We knew he was going to be a good one last year when he played JV ball,” West Mifflin coach Ray Braszo said.

Trinity, however, refused to fade. The Hillers put together a 61-yard drive that was capped by Kern’s 12-yard TD pass to Tyler Denman with 20 seconds left in the first half. The play cut West Mifflin’s lead to 19-14.

Garner, a potential Division I basketball recruit, scored on a 40-yard option run midway through the third quarter that put West Mifflin ahead 26-14. Then, Trinity’s offensive and defensive lines took over.

The Hillers drove 69 yards in 13 running plays, gaining yardage in big chunks, to pull to within 26-21. Joey Koroly, who had 96 yards on 20 carries, scored on a nine-yard run around right end.

“That third quarter, our linemen took charge,” Miller said. “We were moving the ball and playing good defense.”

And that’s what had Braszo concerned.

“They do that to us every year and I don’t understand it,” he said. “They’re always a big team and we’re small. Their size hurts us and that third-quarter drive is what I was afraid of them doing all night. They did the same thing to us last year.”

The Hillers’ defense then forced a West Mifflin punt from deep in the Titans’ end of the field, but a 28-yard kick took a sideways bounce and hit a Trinity player. West Mifflin recovered the ball, and the play set up a 27-yard field goal by Tyler Beck early in the fourth quarter that made it 29-21.

The Hillers had one more scoring drive in them and it was a quick one. Kern, who passed for 182 yards, hit Koroly on a throwback screen that went 80 yards for a touchdown down the left sideline. Kern, however, was stopped inches shy of the goal line on the two-point conversion when he scrambled up the middle.

The Hillers had one more possession, but two sacks after Trinity reached the West Mifflin 30 ended the game.

“We still have an opportunity next week to earn a spot in the playoffs,” Miller said.