Some of the information for this story is courtesy of the DuBois Courier-Express/Tri-County Sunday

IMPERIAL – In the alphabet, Brumbaugh comes up just ahead of Buganza, and on the football field Brumbaugh came out ahead of Buganza as well.

In a dual of two of the top quarterbacks in Western Pennsylvania, South Fayette’s Christian Brumbaugh outpassed Brockway’s Derek Buganza 374 yards, 5 touchdowns to 340 yards, 3 touchdowns to help the WPIAL champion Lions to a more-lopsided than it really was 62-28 win over the Rovers in the PIAA Class AA quarterfinals Friday night at West Allegheny High School.

Brockway (12-1) trailed by just a touchdown, 35-28, heading to the fourth quarter but got outscored 27-0 in the quarter by South Fayette (14-0). But even that is deceiving, as 20 of the 27 points came in the final 5:58 of the game with the big score being a 21-yard interception return for a touchdown by Tanner Coutard with 5:58 to play that ended Brockway’s comeback hopes. It was Coutard’s third defensive touchdown of the season and the seventh of the year for South Fayette.

But the real story was the battle of the quarterbacks.

Brumbaugh, a 6-foot-4 senior was nearly flawless going 22 of 26 for his 380 yards and five scores vs. no interceptions. He passed Sto-Rox’s Adam DiMichele for the all-time WPIAL passing touchdown record – he now has 80, and he sits just 52 yard shy of DiMichele’s WPIAL record 6,741 yards. With 6,690 yards he broke the South Fayette career mark of 6,573 set by Andrew DiDonato from 2002-2005, and he has the 14^th most yards in state history.

Buganza, meanwhile, the state-record holder in career passing yards, was 25 of 44 with the three touchdowns but also threw three picks after throwing just nine in the Rovers first 12 games. He unofficially finishes his career with 9,752 yards and 95 touchdowns, with the latter being the District 9 record.

Brumbaugh and South Fayette looked like they were going to make it a blowout in the first quarter taking a 21-7 lead at the end of the first 12 minutes thanks to Brumbaugh touchdown passes of 56 yards to Zach Challingsworth, 12 yards and 63 to Josh Patterson. Brockway scored on a 13-yard Buganza to Zach Freemer pass that tied the score at seven at the time.

But the Rovers fought back in the second quarter cutting the lead to 21-14 on a 1-yard Buganza run with 7:25 left in the half.

South Fayette answered with an 8-yard Jeff Davis run making it 28-14 with 4:48 to play, but the Rovers came right back with a 10-yard Buganza to Jake Shaffer touchdown cutting the deficit to seven, 28-21, at halftime.

A 13-yard Brumbaugh to Eric Myers touchdown pass midway through the third quarter restored the two-score leads for the Lions at 35-21 before Buganza hit Mike Vervoort with a 20-yard scoring pass with 1:09 left in the third making it 35-28.

South Fayette, though, came right back at the start of the fourth quarter when Brumbaugh hit Davis with a 26-yard scoring pass making it 42-28.

The Rovers still had a couple of chances to stay in the game and even caught a break when a Buganza pass was intercepted in South Fayette territory only to have the Lions turn the ball right back over when they fumbled the ensuing return at their own 35-yard line.

Brockway was able to move inside the 25 but turned the ball over on downs when it was stopped on a fourth-and-short run.

South Fayette looked like it was going to put the game away on the ensuing drive, but a Lions fumble deep in Brockway territory gave the Rovers the ball back.

Buganza, however, was intercepted by Coutard who returned it for the back-breaking touchdown.

Tyler Challingsworth then added a 45-yard touchdown run with 4:31 to play and John Lerda a 54-yard scamper with just over a minute left to set the final score.

The Challingsworths combined for 200 yards receiving on 13 catches with Tyler catching nine passes for 108 yards and Zach four for 92. Tyler chipped in an interception on defense and had 70 yards rushing on three carries. Patterson added three catches for 93 yards and Davis three for 40 while running eight times for 68 yards. Davis added an interception on defense.

Vervoort finished with seven catches for 96 yards and the score giving him 55 catches for 911 yards and 11 receiving touchdowns. With 101 carries for 922 yards and 17 touchdowns, he had 1,833 yards of offense with 28 offensive touchdowns on the year while scoring 30 total touchdowns. He finished his career with 173 catches for 2,607 yards and 29 touchdowns while adding 923 yards rushing and 17 touchdowns and scoring a career total of 49 touchdowns.  

Chris Marshall chipped in 17 carries for 52 yards and six catches for 62 yards. Kyle Braun had five grabs for 79 yards and Shaffer three for 49. Freemer added three catches for 44 yards.

SOUTH FAYETTE 62, BROCKWAY 28

Score By Quarters

Brockway     7          14        7          0          —        28

South Fayette          21        7          7          27        —        62

Scoring Summary

First Quarter

SF – Zach Challingsworth 56 pass from Christian Brumbaugh (Tyler Yee kick), 9:53.

BW – Zack Freemer 13 pass from Derek Buganza (Philip Esposito kick), 5:33.

SF – Josh Patterson 12 pass from Brumbaugh (Yee kick), 3:02.

SF – Patterson 63 pass from Brumbaugh (Yee kick), 1:04.

Second Quarter

BW – Buganza 1 run (Esposito kick), 7:25.

SF – Jeff Davis 8 run (Yee kick), 4:48.

BW – Jake Shaffer 10 pass from Buganza, 1:21.

Third Quarter

SF – Eric Myers 13 pass from Brumbaugh (Yee kick), 5:37.

BW – Mike Vervoort 20 pass from Buganza (Esposito kick), 1:09.

Fourth Quarter

SF – Davis 26 pass from Brumbaugh (Yee kick), 11:47.

SF – Tanner Coutard 21 interception return (Yee kick), 5:58

SF – Tyler Challingsworth 45 run (Yee kick), 4:31.

SF – John Lerda 54 run (Run failed), 1:03.

            B         S

First Downs   25        20

Rushes-Yards            28-59  14-198

Passing Yards           340     380

Comp-Att-Int  25-44-3          22-26-0

Total Yardage            399     578

Punts-Average          2-26.5 0-0

Fumbles-lost  2-0      2-2

Penalties-Yards         4-32    10-95

INDIVIDUAL STATISTICS

Rushing – Brockway: Chris Marshall 17-52, Derek Buganza 9-13, Zack Freemer 1-0, Team 1-(-6). South Fayette: Jeff Davis 8-68, Tyler Challingsworth 3-70, Derek Yanosick 2-6, John Lerda 1-54.

Passing – Brockway: Derek Buganza 25 of 44, 340 yards, 3 TD, 3 INT. South Fayette: 22 of 26, 380 yards, 5 TD, 0 INT.

Receiving – Brockway: Zack Freemer 3-44, Chris Marshall 6-62, Kyle Braun 5-79, Jake Shaffer 3-49, Mike Vervoort 7-96, Levi Miller 1-10. South Fayette: Tyler Challingsworth 9-108, Zach Challingsworth 4-92, Eric Myers 3-41, Josh Patterson 3-93, Jeff Davis 3-40.

Interceptions – Brockway: None. South Fayette: Tyler Challingsworth, Jeff Davis, Tanner Coutard.