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Happy birthday Sebastien Donald Vosik Pekala!

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Happy birthday Avery Grace Zara!

Hey, where&#8217;s Old Forge?Sorry Blue Devils, your stranglehold on the District 2 Class A football title is about to end Friday night.Instead, a new champion will be crowned when Lackawanna Trail (7-3) plays at Northwest (7-3) at 7 p.m. Trail will be going for its first district championship since 2007. Northwest last won a district title in 2009.As for Old Forge (4-6), the winner of the last three D2-A championships never got its offense going this year. The Blue Devils will be playing Friday night all right, but in the Eastern Conference Class A title contest.The Trail-Northwest winner isn&#8217;t guaranteed a place in the PIAA Class A state playoffs. It will have to face the District 1 champion &#8212; either Delco Christian (3-6) or Jenkintown (6-2) &#8212; next weekend to qualify.Nor is the winner of the regular-season meeting &#8212; Trail 35-19 in Week 4 &#8212; guaranteed to be the favorite. Much has changed since then, especially for Northwest.&#8220;They didn&#8217;t beat us that night, they whooped us,&#8221; Northwest coach Lon Hazlet said. &#8220;They were just a better football team. We turned the ball over. We weren&#8217;t physical like we normally are. They are an excellent football team.&#8220;We certainly looked back at it. We tried to make some changes, but at the same time we&#8217;re a completely different crew than we were in Week 4. We&#8217;re hoping for better results.&#8221;The Rangers were a very inexperienced group back then and it showed as they left Trail with a 1-3 record. Sophomore quarterback David Piestrak was still getting acquainted with playing at the varsity level. Junior running back Jake Anderson was getting adjusted from being a complimentary runner to the main guy.Meanwhile, Trail had plenty of guys on the field who played in the D2-A championship game in 2015.&#8220;I definitely think it gives us kids a little bit of confidence,&#8221; Trail coach Steve Jervis said of the Week 4 victory, &#8220;anytime time you can see a team in person. They improved a lot. They haven&#8217;t lost since Week 4. I gave them a lot of credit &#8212; their coaching staff, their kids. They have some good size and utilize their size well. They have some good athletes.&#8221;Jervis singled out three Northwest skill guys: Piestrak, Anderson and receiver Ezra Judge. Piestrak has four of his seven TD passes in the last two games. Anderson enters off a 273-yard rushing performance in a 49-35 win against Tunkhannock. His 1,438 yards rushing are second best in the entire Wyoming Valley Conference. Only Williamsport&#8217;s Treyson Potts (1,607) has more.As for Judge, he seems like he&#8217;s been at Northwest forever. The senior has been one of the steadiest players in the WVC throughout his career as a receiver and defensive back. He leads Northwest with 18 receptions for 291 yards and four TDs. His four interceptions also pace the team.The Rangers have won six in a row since the Trail loss, with the last four victories gut-wrenching to the very end.&#8220;That was a night of reckoning,&#8221; Hazlet said of the Trail loss. &#8220;My boys came out of the locker room after Lackawanna Trail and one after one, they had tears in their eyes. They were not at all happy with where we were at. I set them down the next time we got together. One, I told them it wasn&#8217;t the end of the world. It was just high school football. But two, we had to mature and learn to practice better.&#8221;Trail has its own version of Judge in senior Matt Bergey. He leads the Lions with 24 catches for 561 yards and four touchdowns. He also tops the team with five interceptions.Trail quarterback Nathan Rolka is also a sophomore like Piestrak, but has two years of experience running the show. Unlike Piestrak, he doesn&#8217;t pose much of a threat as a runner, but he can throw and has connected on 63 of 111 passes for 964 yards.The Lions prefer a ground approach offensively. They run a Wing-T offense with three seniors &#8212; Tom Huffsmith (920 yds., 13 TDs), James Gillespie (438, 3 TDs) and Anthony Berrios (334, 6 TDs) &#8212; as the focal point.<style>
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<div class="neCaption">Sophomore Nathan Rolka is in his second year as Lackawanna Trail&#8217;s starting quarterback. </div></div><div class="metaInfo"><photo0>https://www.timesleader.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/11/web1_ABJ-LT-Football-2.jpg</photo0><caption0>Sophomore Nathan Rolka is in his second year as Lackawanna Trail&#8217;s starting quarterback. </caption0><photoCredit0>Times Leader file photo </photoCredit0></div></div>
<div class="metaInfo"><bylineMeta>By John Erzarjerzar@www.timesleader.com</bylineMeta></div><div class="metaInfo"><factboxMeta>WEEK 11 SCHEDULEFriday(7 p.m.)D2/4-6A SemifinalsHazleton Area at WilliamsportD2-4A QuarterfinalsCoughlin at Valley ViewCrestwood at North PoconDallas at Wyoming AreaWest Scranton at BerwickD2-3A SemifinalsLake-Lehman at GARNanticoke at Scranton PrepD2-A ChampionshipLackawanna Trail at NorthwestEastern Conference 3A ChampionshipMeyers at Western Wayne</factboxMeta></div><div class="metaInfo"><shirttailMeta>Reach John Erzar at 570-991-6394 or on Twitter @TLJohnErzar</shirttailMeta></div>

Northwest, Lackawanna Trail to battle for D2-A football title