panthers football

PHOTOS: Big Plays Doom Wolverines In Defeat; Riverside Panthers Victorious

Big plays doomed the Ellwood City, as a 94-yard first quarter touchdown run, kick-started what became on offensive onslaught by Neshannock as the visiting Lancers routed the Wolverines 44-0 Friday night. The Lancers used five scoring plays of over 30 yards, including two scoring runs of 55+ yards, to race away to victory. The Wolverines offense was held to under 100 yards of total offense.  The game was called with 4:08 left when a series of lightning strikes occurred in the distance. Ellwood City (0-4 overall) will next travel to play Freedom to continue its section play. As part of…


PHOTOS: Riverside Falls to Freedom; Wolverines Shut Out

Nathan Sciarro accounted for three scores Friday night for Riverside while Ben Hughes tossed three touchdown strikes, but the biggest score of the game – a late 2-point conversion – was thwarted by Freedom and the Bulldogs escaped with a 31-30 victory over the Panthers. Trailing with less than three minutes to play, Riverside quarterback Ben Hughes connected with Josh Bishop on a 48-yard touchdown strike to bring the host Panthers within a point.  A decision was made to go for the two-point conversion and lead, but the rush play was stopped. Hughes finished the game with 12 completions for…


Panthers Set To Travel For WPIAL Playoff Opening Round Game

The Riverside Panthers will make an 80-mile journey and travel to Charleroi on Friday for their opening round game Friday night at 7:30pm in Carroll Township. The Panthers (6-3 overall) gathered a 13-seed in the Class-AA WPIAL Playoffs and will open with a defacto road game against Interstate Conference champion Charleroi (8-1 overall) on the Cougars home turf. Riverside is led by junior Ben Hughes (6-2, 200, Jr., QB) and senior LeMarcus Cleckley on offense. The Panthers have gone as far as the semifinals in two consecutive Class AA playoffs and will hope to make a run this year as…


PHOTOS: Riverside Panthers Knocked Off By A Late New Brighton Touchdown

New Brighton backer Ashton Fath scored with less than a minute in regulation to boost the Lions to a 22-16 road victory over the Panthers Friday night. Riverside held a 13-8 halftime lead on the strength of a Nathan Sciarro touchdown run and Ben Hughes 10-yard touchdown pass and led midway through the final quarter. Panther kicker Sciarro connected on a 30-plus yard field goal in the wet, soggy field conditions in the fourth quarter to give Riverside their last lead at 16-14. The Panthers possessed the ball with under four minutes to play but came up just short on…


PHOTOS: Panthers Knock Off Wolverines In Rivalry Game

The Riverside Panthers used a 127-yard rushing performance by LeMarcus Cleckley to knock off the Ellwood City Wolverines 21-7 to capture the Rivell Cup victory. Cleckley found the end zone in the third quarter while quarterback Ben Hughes connected on two touchdown strikes, a 14-yard score to Nathan Sciarro in the first half and a 6-yard connection to Nic Ottaviani, to lead the Panthers (5-2, 3-2) offense to victory.  Ottaviani also finished with 46 yards rushing while Sciarro finished with a game-high five catches. After trailing only 7-0 at halftime, the Wolverines offense was only able to find the end zone early in…


PHOTOS: Panthers Fall To Mohawk In Homecoming Game

Congratulations to Sarina Steigerwald the 2018 Riverside Homecoming Queen who was crowned by the Crown Bearer Natalie Bologna at half time. In football action, the Riverside Panthers fell to Mohawk 34-18 Friday night in a Midwestern Conference showdown.  Both teams entered the homecoming contest vying for playoff positions. Warriors running back Braydon Cameron scored three times on the ground and defensively with an interception return of 80 yards to lead Mohawk (6-1, 5-1) to victory. Cameron led all of Lawrence County in rushing coming into the contest with 803 yards on 125 carries and added to his totals in the…


Riverside Bounces Back In Victory; Wolverines Fall Short On Road

After being handed a lopsided shutout defeat last week, the Riverside Panthers were looking to rebound on their home field Friday night and prevailed in a convincing 24-0 shutout victory over Western Beaver. The Panther defense bounced back in pitching the shutout, allowing less than 150 yards of total offense. The Riverside offense was able to score early and relied on the ground game to dictate the mistake-free victory. LeMarcus Cleckley scored two first half touchdowns to lead the offense with sophomore Hunter Nulph capping the scoring with a 36-yard run in the fourth quarter. Wyatt Ray knocked in a…


Riverside Fall Sport Senior Q&A Part 2

With school starting back up and the fall sport season in full swing, the people at EllwoodCity.org decided to sit down and talk to some of the senior athletes at Riverside High School to talk about their fall sport and their future plans. Seniors shared their favorite part of the sport, along with the prep they went through prior to the start of the season. This is the second part of a two part series showing the senior athletes behind Riverside High Schools fall sport season, if you haven’t read the first part, CLICK HERE to read it now.  …


Ellwood & Riverside Football Both Defeated Handedly On Road

Both Ellwood City and Riverside football teams took the road Friday night, but were both defeated handedly by their section foes.  Ellwood City fell victim to New Brighton 30-13 while Riverside was shutout by Freedom 43-0. Ellwood City relied heavily on their ground game Friday night, but it was the Lions air attack that led to the New Brighton victory.  Again victimized by the big play, the Wolverine defense allowed an 81-yard touchdown strike on the game’s second play from scrimmage.  Junior quarterback Jackson Hall found senior wideout Caleb Shuler for the early connection.  Wolverine tailback Ricky Pitrelli scored to…


Football Recaps: Panthers Blowout Lancers; Wolverines Fall To Serra Catholic

Both local schools were hosts in high school football action Friday night, the last Friday of August, with Riverside easily dismissing the Neshannock Lancers 45-14 while the Ellwood City Wolverines were on the losing end of a 24-14 contest against Serra Catholic. For Riverside, the Panthers continued strong offensive play that dates back to last season – scoring 31 points in the second quarter and scoring on their opening possession of the second half to evoke the mercy rule. Quarterback Ben Hughes led the offense that scored on every offensive possession and racked up over 340 yards of offense. For…