Bach siblings connect Yough, Pitt
As the spring season nears the end in both collegiate and scholastic sports, a local family has their eyes on two different schools.
Well, at least for a few more weeks.
Hannah Bach is a freshman on the University of Pittsburgh softball team after graduating from Yough last year, while her younger brother, Jarett, is a senior pitcher for Yough and will join his sister next year at Pitt on the baseball team.
The duo has long had a sibling rivalry which has pushed the other and led both to win state titles in 2016.
Hannah, who was a four-year starting shortstop on the Yough softball team, helped lead the Lady Cougars to the PIAA Class AAA crown that year, while Jarett played on the Yough Westmoreland team that won the Pennsylvania State Junior Little League championship.
So far this year, Hannah has played in 24 of Pitt鈥檚 54 games, most of which she has been used as a pinch runner in key situations.
Hannah has scored 11 runs and has nine stolen bases in 12 attempts for the Lady Panthers, who are having a down year at 13-41 after being one pitch from an ACC tournament championship a year ago.
Jarett is 6-0 with a save this year for Yough, and is considered one of the top pitchers in the WPIAL.
Yough has clinched at least a share of Section 1-AAAA title and Bach could lead the team on a deep run in the postseason.
Next year, both will suit up for Pitt in their respective sports and it should make traveling easier for their parents, Ken and Joni, as they will head to Oakland quite a bit next spring.
Crazy Stat of the Week
For years in college football, Group of Five (G5) programs have talked about how some of the Power Five (P5) schools won鈥檛 play them for fear of losing and hurting their postseason chances.
While we are still almost four months away from the start of the college football season, here is a unique stat to look at.
For all of the talk about the UCFs (Central Florida) and Boise States and how the big boys would rather play smaller and less known schools, the G5 programs are not exactly going out of their way to play each other.
People knock Alabama for its annual cupcake non-conference schedule, and look no farther than this coming season for proof.
However, the opening weekend of college football for the 2019 season will feature exactly four games pitting G5 teams against one another.
Those schools can knock the P5 schools all they want, but when G5 schools are loading up on Football Championship Subdivision (FCS) teams instead of playing each other, then they don鈥檛 have room to talk.
Yes, some P5 schools play FCS teams and beat them down, but the FCS teams are getting seven-figure paydays out of the losses.
G5 schools are going to get wins, but the victories will not help the image of the schools at that level.