Nov 10, 2022 3 min read

When Cornelius Coleman played football at Waynesburg University, the week of the game against Washington & Jefferson was just that.

The week of the game against Washington & Jefferson.

Nothing more; nothing less.

So now that he is the head football coach of the Yellow Jackets, he wants to make sure his players don’t get too emotional for Saturday’s PAC finale at Wiley Stadium.

“As a player, I just looked at it as the next game,” said Coleman, who took over the reigns of the team this year. “It was the next opportunity to get better, the next team on the schedule. It’s the same concept I use with our guys.

“I understand the notion of a rivalry. I understand the significance of a conference matchup. All of those are important but at the end of the day, you never want to label one game more as an eye-opening game than the next important game on the schedule. I’ve operated like that the past 18 years of my college career. We understand the significance of everything else.”

Both teams have made decisions on their starting quarterbacks. W&J has eliminated splitting time, installing Jacob Pugh as the starter over Colt Jones.

“It was a tough decision,” said W&J head coach Mike Sirianni. “They are a different style of quarterback and we have become a different style of offense. We are running a lot of (run-pass options). Jake is good at it. We lost (tailback) Justin (Huss) and we had to manufacture a run game. That means the quarterback has to run the ball a little bit. Jake is a better runner. It’s not like Colt did anything wrong. It’s just that we lost a big part of our running game.”

Waynesburg senior starter Tyler Raines suffered a concussion two weeks ago and is still in protocol. It’s possible he will get the green light this week. If not, freshman Thomas Burke will get the start.

“We’re not a team looking at things from a passing or running standpoint,” said Coleman. “We just want to have a balanced offense. In regards to Tyler Raines, he did not play last weekend because he got banged up two weeks ago. He has gone out with the rest of the team to prepare for this weekend. We’ll just see from there.”

Waynesburg has depended on a three-headed attack for its running game with Justin Flack, Hunter Cameron and Nick Hall. The trio has each had their moments to shine and gained a combined for 1,656 yards and 17 touchdowns.

Wide receiver Dakota Romantino has developed into a game-breaker. He has a team-high 37 catches for 690 yards and five touchdowns. He averages nearly 20 yards per reception.

“They’re very good on offense, very good,” said Sirianni. “They have a good quarterback, a good receiver and good running backs.”

Since Huss’ season-ending injury in Week 4, W&J has used a number of running backs. Raymond Holmes has gotten the bulk of the carries, 85, for 381 yards.

John Peduzzi, Anthony Rosati and Ian Hansen have similar statistics.

W&J senior defensive end Alex Keith has made the most of his 20 tackles, 11.5 of them going for quarterback sacks. Sophomore defensive lineman Dawson Dleiz has 9.5 sacks.

Hash marks

Kickoff is 1 p.m. … W&J leads the series 71-7. … W&J averages 35 points per game in the series. … Waynesburg has lost the last 16 games in the series.