FOOTBALL: CB South’s season ends against St. Joe’s Prep

TOWAMENCIN — Every year, it seems, the District 1 champion runs into District 12 champion St. Joseph’s Prep in the PIAA Class 6A semifinals. And virtually every tear, that team loses to Prep.

This year, it was Central Bucks South’s turn.

Juggernaut St. Joseph’s Prep — which draws players from three states and is ranked No. 8 in the country in USA Today’s Top 25 poll — began the PIAA semifinal against CB South with Brandon Rehmann returning the opening kickoff 79 yards for a touchdown.

And the reigning state champion Hawks just continued to pour on the points, blowing out CB South 49-0 Saturday afternoon at North Penn High School to land a return trip to the state title game.

They’ll face North Allegheny next Saturday night at Cumberland Valley High School.

The Hawks (12-1) led 27-0 by the early second quarter and 42-0 by halftime. There was a running clock the rest of the way.

“It’s an elite football program full of elite football players,” CB South coach Tom Hetrick said. “It’s one of those things where it is what it is. We genuinely believed we had a good game plan. We’ve done great things all year. As great as those things are, they weren’t great enough to be able to deal with what we just dealt with today.”

A silver lining for the Titans (13-2) happened when running back Anthony Leonardi broke 2,000 yards for the season. He entered the game needing 76 yards to reach the mark. He finished with 83 — including a 54-yard run on South’s first play from scrimmage — passing the milestone in the fourth quarter.

“It’s crazy,” Leonardi said. “I wouldn’t have been able to do it without my coaches and my offensive line. They paved the way for me all year, with our fullbacks and our receivers blocking on the outside.

“Obviously we wanted to win states, it’s rough, but we had a historic season,” Leonardi said. “It’s amazing to be part of this, to be able to play in a game like this.”

Prep’s defense stiffened after Leonardi’s early run, and the Hawks responded with rushing TDs by Taj Dyches and quarterback Samaj Jones before Kahseim Phillips opened the second period with a 74-yard run to the end zone.

Before halftime, Jones connected with Rehmann for a 47-yard score, and then found Elijah Jones in the end zone from 17 yards out.

Rob Novotny tacked on the Hawks’ final TD in the fourth quarter.

This will be Prep’s 10th state final appearance in the last 11 years. It begs the question, since St. Joe’s can essentially recruit student athletes from anywhere, should the system be set up differently? It doesn’t seem fair to other schools.

“Listen, St. Joe’s are who they are,” Hetrick said. “I don’t want anybody’s sympathy. We don’t want anybody’s pity. My job is to coach football, and we play who we play.

“I guess if you’re playing in the state semifinals against an elite program like that, that’s a pretty good problem to have,” he said.

The Hawks are seeking their eighth state championship. They haven’t lost to a team from Pennsylvania this year. Their only defeat was to IMG Academy, an athletic boarding school in Bradenton, Fla.

“I’ll face everyone the same,” senior offensive lineman Collin Goetter said. “You could be a middle school team or you could be the ’85 Bears, I don’t care. The system is how the system is. Unfortunately, it didn’t break our way this time, but we did a historic thing this year.

“From Homecoming Week 10, to Coach Hetrick’s first playoff win, to getting our first away win in the playoffs, and coming in and beating West at West — that was a surreal feeling. I’ll never forget that,” Goetter said. “And winning the district title. It’s something I’ll always see in my head, doing it as a team, because these guys are my brothers.”

South won its first district football title in the 20-year history of the school, before running into Prep.

“There’s no excuses, football is football,” Leonardi said of losing to the Hawks. “At the end of the day, they’re 17-, 18-year-old high schoolers, just like us. If that’s how the system has to be, that’s how it has to be. We came out and battled our hearts out. I have no complaints.”

Corey Moore added a 21-yard run for the Titans. In five playoff games, he and Leonardi combined for 1,150 yards and 14 touchdowns. They are part of an accomplished senior class that helped lay the foundation for future success at CB South, which will return several key players next year, including quarterback Owen Pinkerton and members of the defensive front.

“It’s been such a special group,” Hetrick said of his seniors. “I’ve known them since they were in sixth and seventh grade. They’re the kind of guys you root for. If anything like what we’ve done this year is going to happen to a senior group, this is the group you want it to happen for.

“It’s a gift to be able to do what I do and hang out with people from the South side of the tracks, because genuinely pure, salt of the earth people,” Hetrick said. “I couldn’t love them any more.”

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Email Christiaan DeFranco at cdefranco@thereporteronline.com. Follow him on X at @the_defranc, or visit ChrisDeFranco.com.