Blue Raiders grew into their potential

KINGSTON — It’s not speculation to say that the 2019 Tamaqua varsity football program had its best season in school history.

A group featuring 17 seniors and led by head coach Sam Bonner came up just short of the ultimate dream season in the PIAA 3A semifinals against Wyoming Area on Friday night.

Bonner’s team grew immensely in just a few calendar months. It’s not uncommon to see some changes throughout the course of a high school season. But this team continued to get stronger as the schedule inched closer to the end.

“Nothing to be ashamed of,” said Bonner after the game. “The kids played great. I think we surprised a lot of people throughout the course of the year, especially in these playoffs.”

Looking back, the Raiders dashed out to a 5-0 start after steamrolling through the first half of their regular-season schedule. Then, there was some adversity after dropping back-to-back games against Pottsville and North Schuylkill.

That Oct. 4 regular season loss to the Spartans turned out to be nothing but a blip on the radar, however. After getting punched in the mouth a few times, the senior-laden club responded with a furious flurry of haymakers to close out the regular season and the District 11 playoffs.

“No doubt. I thought we improved, especially in the second half of the season,” said Bonner. “Honestly, not taking anything away from them, we didn’t’ play our best football tonight. We had some costly penalties, and in big games, we usually don’t do that kind of stuff.”

Tamaqua came out on top of a shootout with Notre Dame in the first round of the district playoffs, a year after the Crusaders ended the Raiders’ district title hopes. The revenge tour continued a week later, when Tamaqua landed another knockout punch with a 20-0 thumping of North Schuylkill, who defeated the Raiders in the regular season.

It was now clear that at this point of the season, the eastern half of the state was dealing with a different Tamaqua team than we saw in August; a team with a different type of confidence, camaraderie and swagger.

“It’s sad, it’s one of those things, you never want it to stop,” said Bonner. “Our senior class — and I’m not taking anything away from our underclassmen because they really helped out — but this senior class has been playing together since seventh grade. It’s sad to see them go. Not just on a loss, but in general. They’re a great bunch of kids.”

Many pegged the Raiders as underdogs during its first two state playoff games. But it didn’t matter.

Pope John Paul II was no match for the Blue and White. Nor was Wyomising, who owned victories against both North Schuylkill and Pottsville during the regular season, and was undefeated before the Blue Flock took care of business against them.

“The locker room ... they’re the kind of kids that want to hang out and be around football and each other,” said Bonner. “You don’t always get that team chemistry. This year, we had it and it was obvious with how we played.“

There were a ton of individual accolades along the journey, especially by a trio of seniors. Nate Boyle is now the school’s all-time leader in rushing yards, rushing touchdowns and total touchdowns. Quarterback Brayden Knobaluch owns the passing yards and passing touchdown records, while receiver Matt Kistler is the Raiders’ all-time leader receiving yards and receptions.

“They’re upset now, it’s tough. It’s kind of an end of an era of Tamaqua football,” said Bonner. “Nothing beats Friday night football and these guys have realized it and appreciated it over the last four or five weeks.”

The community and Raider family rallied around this program during the postseason run and it was truly special. The town was decked out in Raiders’ colors as blue and white flooded the streets and could be found on light poles and in windows. There were fire truck escorts after victories and pep rallies at school. And there were surely memories that nobody will ever forget during a once-in-a-lifetime scenario for everyone involved.

Tamaqua was on the wrong side of the scoreboard on Friday. But the Blue Raiders left blood, sweat and tears on the turf in Kingston. They grew up and definitely never gave up.

“It says a lot about my coaching staff and says a lot about the kids,” said Bonner. “The run that we had, winning 12 games, the most ever before that was 10. These guys are a great bunch of kids and I’m going to miss the seniors. It was incredible what they did this year. I got a bunch of awesome kids. We’re going to miss that senior class tremendously.”