PITTSBURGH — The Westinghouse football team is on a mission to become the second-ever city league team to win a state championship.
The Bulldogs have made program history as the runner-up in 2A in the last two years. Over the last two seasons, Westinghouse is 27 and 2 with those two losses coming in the state championship. But this year, the Bulldogs got to do something they haven’t had the opportunity to do in nearly three years: get to play a game the week after a loss.
“Losing the first game out of the gate created its own challenges,” said Bulldogs Head Coach Donta Green. “But it also created a hunger in our guys.”
Westinghouse started this season off with a 28-26 loss to Beaver
“That loss really puts something in our hearts to know we can be beat,” said senior wide receiver Lloyd Penn. “I’m happy we got to learn that early and not late. Now we get to learn off the loss. I really don’t think it’s a loss. I’m gonna take it as a lesson.”
“When I lost, I didn’t really know how to handle it,” added junior defensive end Josiah Collins. “Now it’s just about helping my teammates through the loss, and how we can get better from the loss.”
Since then, the Bulldogs have been on a five-game win streak featuring three consecutive shutouts, and have outscored opponents 262-23.
“We like to say our confidence comes from our consistency,” said Green, “Our confidence comes from the hard work and dedication.”
The upperclassmen know the heartbreak of being on the cusp of history and a state title…twice.
“Those two losses hurt, hurt me bad,” said Penn.
“Just being on those two teams, it’s like when I’m coming, I’m coming to show people stuff and help people and make them better so we can when we get there, we finish this time,” said Collins.
Finish is a word that’s been used constantly by the Bulldogs this season.
“We break it all the way down,” said Green. “Finishing every single rep, finishing every single set, finishing every day, finishing every week, strong and hopefully finishing the games, hopefully finish the season.”
“We got little checkpoints,” added Penn “I call them pit stops, you know, to get to the end of the race. You know, the city championship, district championship, it’s just keeping the mentality on state championship no matter what.”
Nothing they say is big enough, until they win that race.
“Everything I do is to help this team win a state championship,” said Collins. “Everything we do is to help us win a state championship.”
And they’re confident this year is the year.
“I’ll just see y’all when we win states,” said Penn.
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