Crowning Moments
ADAMS TWP — To the victors go the spoils.
And Mars soccer piled up plenty of victories this year.
Mars Area High School girls coach Blair Gerlach was recently named Pennsylvania Soccer Coaches Association Class 3A Girls Coach of the Year. He became the first repeat winner in that classification since the award's inception in 1967.
Mars boys coach Chris Knauff recently received the Western Pennsylvania Soccer Coaches Association Class 3A Boys Coach of the Year honor.
Both Mars teams went undefeated this season in capturing WPIAL and PIAA championships.
“That's something that will probably never happen again,” Mars athletic director Scott Heinauer said. “No school in the state has ever done it before. It's an incredible feat.
“And doing it in a year where only the district champions went on to the state playoffs — where there was no margin for error — makes it even more amazing. Dealing with such high expectations and the pressure that comes with that ... I mean, these are high school kids.”
The Lady Planets have won 41 games in a row over the past two years. They ended this season with nine successive shutouts, including all of their postseason games.
Since 2002, Gerlach has racked up three state titles, five WPIAL crowns and 14 section championships.“To do what this team has done in a year where there is so much distress and difficult news out there ... to make something celebratory happen shows that greatness can come even under dire circumstances,” Gerlach said.“With COVID, no one knew the season would even happen. There was the aspect of repeating what last year's team did, the high expectations in the community, then the (United Soccer Coaches) rank us No. 1 in the nation and put that target on our backs. These girls embraced all that pressure.“A number of them want to compete at high-level college programs. To do that, you have to deal with high-pressure situations. They liked it,” Gerlach added.The coach added that any player, coach or team award is something for the community to take pride in.“In these times, if this award puts a smile on even one face for a day, it's all worth it,” Gerlach said.Gerlach has also been named Region Coach of the Year — covering Pennsylvania, New Jersey and New York — and is eligible for the national award to be announced at a later date.While Gerlach is a Northern Steel Soccer executive director of coaching and owns a supplemental soccer training program, Knauff is a business education teacher at Mars.Knauff also graduated from Mars in 1998 and played on the first Planet boys soccer team to ever qualify for the WPIAL playoffs.“Coming back to your alma mater and winning a state championship means a lot to him,” Heinauer said of Knauff. “I'm happy for him. You never know if you're going to get back there.”Knauff guided Mars to a PIAA championship game appearance in 2007 and WPIAL Class 2A titles in 2008 and 2009. His teams have won 10 section titles and reached the WPIAL final seven times.“It's so different now compared to when I was playing here,” Knauff said. “When I played, we didn't cut anybody and hardly anybody played club soccer.“This year, we kept 34 players and pretty much everybody plays club.”Knauff played college soccer at Pitt-Greensburg before getting into coaching. He first served as an assistant under Gerlach with the boys team.“The odds of something like this happening are so slim,” Knauff said of the boys and girls teams polishing off perfect seasons in the same year. “These kids beat those odds.“One stumble in the playoffs was all it would have taken. It never happened.”Knauff said the support system Mars soccer receives can't be overlooked.“Awards like this come from the players you have, the assistant coaches, community and parents,” he said. “So much goes into the success of this program.”Gerlach echoed those sentiments.“Whether we practice at 6 a.m. or 10 at night, people accept that culture around here,” Gerlach said. “Everybody is all in — and it pays off.”
