From the first play from scrimmage in Friday night’s PIAA 5A first-round matchup at Whitehall High School’s Zephyr Stadium, it was clear that Roman Catholic possessed too much firepower for the District 11 5A champions.

Akron commit and senior quarterback Semaj Beals hit Eyan Stead on a deep ball for a 68-yard touchdown and the Cahillites only continued their domination from there, cruising to a 49-7 win over the Zephyrs.

Roman Catholic moves on in the PIAA 5A tournament to play the winner of Hollidaysburg and Delaware Valley next weekend while Whitehall finishes the year with a 10-3 record and its sixth district championship in the past decade.

Whitehall coach Andy Marino left the field emotional after his team’s bounce-back from a district championship loss to East Stroudsburg South a season ago.

“I’m really proud of the team. The way they came together…it was something unique. You don’t get to do what they did if you’re not a little bit different in your preparation,” Marino said. “Hopefully they take the life lessons of putting the work in, being disciplined, being part of a team and doing what’s best for the team.”

Beals completed nine of his 13 passes for 199 yards and four touchdowns, in less than a half of action, to lead the Philadelphia Catholic League 5A champions to touchdowns on their first six drives of the game.

Stead was the benefactor on all three of his catches on the night, finding the end zone each time for a combined 74 yards while junior teammate Eisa Nealy set up a pair of those scores with long receptions of 33 and 40 yards and sandwiched a two-yard touchdown in between the long gains.

It was the vertical passing attack that coach Rick Prete complimented the most after an efficient offensive onslaught.

“It wasn’t really a personnel thing. It was just a scheme thing. They challenge you outside, and we were wondering if they were going to do that, and they did. And, obviously, we feel really good about our guys on the outside,” Prete said. “[Coach Danny Grazinsky and coach Marcus Hammond] both work with the quarterbacks all the time, and they work so hard. And then Semaj [Beals] and Jahmil [Hawkins], they work really hard at it as well. So it’s just that work coming to fruition.”

Even with starting running back Trey Montgomery on the bench for disciplinary reasons, the running game didn’t struggle either. Hanif Sheed and Rogzel Sutton formed a two-headed monster and helped mitigate the loss of Montgomery with 167 combined yards on the ground on just 14 carries in the first half alone.

The highest scoring offense in the EPC moved the ball well on the Cahillite defense but often failed to finish in opposing territory. Of their seven first half possessions, the Zephyrs turned it over on downs six times with three of those instances coming on the Roman Catholic side of the field.

“We thought we could find some things and obviously you try to get the ball to your best player. They were pretty fast, so they took away a lot of our lateral stuff, so we found some more vertical stuff,” Marino said. “We thought we could do some things with motions that could free some things up. Talon [Dogmanits] made some plays and Tanner [Dogmanits] got him the ball.”

Talon, the older of the two brothers, capped off his incredible career with seven receptions for 86 yards, including one final touchdown reception from his brother, Tanner. Even against a tremendous defense, the senior found success downfield and was able to keep the Zephyrs offense moving in the right direction.

That final touchdown is one he’ll never forget.

“It was big. This game obviously didn’t turn out how we wanted it to, but I was thankful to come back here. The last touchdown of the season was at home,” Dogmanits said. “That’s special. I caught it from my brother. That makes it a bit more special.”

The lethal connection added to their lead as Talon remains the EPC’s leader in receiving yards after another big night while his brother added to his lead for second place in the league in passing yards.

Marino and the Zephyrs will miss having them both in the locker room even if their star quarterback will be back for one more year in the maroon and gold.

“It starts at home. To have a really good program, you need to have a lot of support at home, and they have that,” Marino said. “They’re great kids and they’re great competitors. It’s cool to see.”

From a broader perspective, Talon Dogmanits and an outstanding senior class will leave the program as they found it by bookending their careers with a district championship as freshmen and now as seniors.

The emotional star wide receiver was a big reason why, but his selflessness shined in the final moments of his impactful career.

“An 8-2 regular season hasn’t been done in like 12 years. So, that was really special. And then being able to put gold district medals around our necks after getting silver last year, it was a big moment,” Dogmanits said. “My numbers are only because of what [Tanner] does. He makes great plays, and he’s able to find me the ball. And my line, they held strong tonight. Those kids were strong, they were big, they were fast, but we held our own.”

Derek Bast is a freelance writer who can be found on Twitter/X at @derek_bast. He can be reached by email at derekbast11@gmail.com. 

ROMAN CATHOLIC 49, WHITEHALL 7

Roman Catholic: 28; 14; 7; 0 — 49

Whitehall: 0; 0; 0; 7 — 7

ORDER OF SCORING  

First quarter 

RC: Eyan Stead 68 pass from Semaj Beals (Eli Pollack kick); 11:44

RC: Rogzel Sutton 2 run (Pollack kick); 7:59

RC: Hanif Sheed 2 run (Pollack kick); 3:52

RC: Stead 5 pass from Beals (Pollack kick); 0:18

Second quarter

RC: Eisa Nealy 2 pass from Beals (Pollack kick); 7:35

RC: Stead 1 pass from Beals (Pollack kick); 4:24

Third quarter 

RC: Shane Hubert 47 pass from Jahmil Hawkins (Noah Beasley kick); 6:21

Fourth quarter

W: Talon Dogmanits 8 pass from Tanner Dogmanits (Cole Richards kick); 11:57

TEAM STATISTICS

RC; W

First downs; 14; 13

Rushes-yards; 22-227; 42-127

Passing yards; 246; 120

Comp-Att-INTs; 10-15-1; 12-21-0

Punts; 1-39; 2-41.5

Fumbles-lost; 0-0; 0-0

Penalties-yards; 6-45; 2-20

INDIVIDUAL STATISTICS 

Rushing: (RC) Hanif Sheed 8-120, TD; Rogzel Sutton 6-47, TD; Enrico Gianeruso 5-32; Jahmil Hawkins 3-28; (W) Iskandor Blanco 12-54; Kevin Herrera 14-54; Justin Hussett 3-10; Tanner Dogmanits 11-8; Talon Dogmanits 1-4; Henry Shultz 1-(-3).

Passing: (RC) Semaj Beals 9-13-1, 199 yards, 4 TDs; Hawkins 1-2-0, 47 yards, TD; (W) Tanner Dogmanits 12-21-0, 120 yards, TD.

Receiving: (RC) Eisa Nealy 3-75, TD; Eyan Stead 3-74, 3 TDs; Ash Roberts 3-50; Shane Hubert 1-47, TD; (W) Talon Dogmanits 7-86, TD; Blanco 1-21; Hussett 2-10; Shultz 1-4; Rocco Fonzone 1-(-1).

Whitehall interceptions: Benjamin Pychinka.

https://www.mcall.com/2025/11/14/piaa-5a-football-roman-catholic-thumps-whitehall/