Aug 6, 2024 3 min read

To the victor goes the spoils.

Grove City earned its third Presidents’ Athletic Conference (PAC) football championship in program history last fall, and as a result, the Wolverines were selected as the preseason favorite.

The preseason poll was announced Tuesday afternoon at PAC Football Media Day on the campus of Saint Vincent College in Latrobe for the 17th straight year.

The poll was voted on by the PAC head coaches, sports information directors and members of the media.

Washington & Jefferson College was picked to finish third with 378 points and three first-place votes. Waynesburg University came in ninth place with 133 points.

Grove City received 29 first-place votes and 444 total points.

Wolverines head coach Andrew DiDonato, who is in his ninth year, attended media day with senior quarterback Logan Pfeuffer, who is a Peters Township graduate. Teammate Brady Spolnik, who is a senior defensive lineman from South Fayette, was listed as one of the PAC Players to Watch.

“Polls are a reflection of last year and this is a reminder of how special the 2023 season was,” DiDonato said. “After 0-10 (in 2016), we said to focus on vision, not circumstances, and we say the same thing after going 10-0. So we are excited to get back to focus on our vision and lay one brick each day.”

Carnegie Mellon was selected second with eight first-place votes and 417 points. Case Western Reserve University was fourth with 335 points and Westminster College rounded out the top five with 310 points and two first-place votes.

Allegheny College (219), Geneva College (192), Saint Vincent College (154), the Yellow Jackets, Thiel College (129) and Bethany College (61) rounded out the remaining six teams in the conference.

The Presidents’ PAC Players to Watch list included seniors Zach Cernuto (TE), Dawson Dietz (DL), Avery Keith (DL), Jacob Pugh (QB) and Zachai Simmons (DB). Junior wide receiver John Peduzzi made the list.

W&J head coach Mike Sirianni and fifth-year linebacker Justin Johns represented the Presidents.

Sirianni’s squad will look to push the program’s streak of consecutive winning seasons to 41 years. The Presidents are looking for more than winning seasons, as they hope to win their first conference crown and trip to the NCAA Division III Playoffs for the first time since 2018.

“What we did as a staff this past year was look at these guys (PAC opponents) out here to see what the common denominator was, and it was just their toughness,” Sirianni said. “That’s what we really focused on, that toughness and how we can get back to winning conference championships.”

Waynesburg had five players on the “watch list,” as seniors Brennan Boron (DB) and Jemuel Cypress (LB) got the nod. Juniors Jacob Brisky (OL), Zayne Cawley (RB) and Isaac Trout (WR) were also selected.

The Yellow Jackets were represented at media day by head coach Dr. Cornelius Coleman and Boron.

“We now have over 40 juniors on our roster and have a strength with our returning senior class,” Coleman said. “We just excited about the newfound leadership that we have within our program. Our leadership group is able to bond together, push one another, make things competitive, but, also on the flip side, make us as coaches accountable to go out each and every day to coach them the right way.”

Carnegie Mellon graduate student Adrian Williams, a Peters Township graduate, made the list as a defensive back.

The season begins Sept. 7 with all 11 teams in conference action. All five games are scheduled to kickoff at 1 p.m.