Mention the Rochester High School football team and a couple images come to mind. One is of a big, strong Class A squad that likes to pound away at an opposing defense with power running backs such as Essex Law.

The other is of the Rams playing for a WPIAL title at Heinz Field.

Rochester will play for a WPIAL Class A title if it can get past undefeated Clairton (11-0) at 7:30 tomorrow night at Dormont Stadium. As for the powerful running back, well, times have changed some.

Rochester backs still run hard, it's just that they aren't all that big this season.

Meet the Rams' smurfs: The team's leading rushers are 5-foot-9 Chad Pennington, 5-9 Bryan Beightley and 5-8 Trey Johnson. And let's not forget quarterback Brandon Gray, the giant in the backfield at 5-10.

They are hardly pile movers and they are a far cry from Derrick Moye, a Penn State wide receiver who at 6-5 was Rochester's main man two seasons ago. But the smurfs have helped the Rams to a 10-1 record.

Johnson, who might be shorter than his listed height, had the big game in Rochester's 35-14 victory Friday against rival Western Beaver in the quarterfinals at Geneva College. He scored touchdowns on a 23-yard pass from Gray and a 2-yard run, and almost got a third when he intercepted a pass and returned it to the Western Beaver 9.

"He's tough as nails," Rochester coach Gene Matsook said of Johnson. "He looks like he's 5-7, but plays like he's 6-4."

So far Johnson has rushed for 386 yards on 67 carries -- that's 5.8 yards per attempt -- and caught 16 passes for another 315. He's the Rams' leading scorer with 15 touchdowns.

On his 23-yard touchdown reception, Johnson used a nifty move to get into the end zone. He caught the football at about the 10, then turned toward the middle of the field and ran past two would-be tacklers. Why cut inside instead of outside?

"I don't know," Johnson said with a smile. "It was just instincts."

In the third quarter, with the score tied 14-14, Johnson outjumped a taller -- just about everybody on the field was -- defender for a 20-yard reception on a fourth-and-15 play, coming down at the Western Beaver 2. He then ran into the end zone onf the next play.

"A lot of people underestimate me for my size," he said. "So I make up for it when I jump. It happened at Monessen, too, and they tried to outjump me down there."

Pennington is Rochester's leading rusher with 885 yards on 141 carries and he has caught 10 passes for another 298. Beightley has rushed for 487 yards on 78 attempts and ran for 90 yards on 13 attempts against Western Beaver.

Rochester finds itself in the WPIAL semifinals for the eighth time in nine years. And it is playing a familiar foe. Clairton defeated Rochester in the quarterfinals last year.

"It's a rematch and I was glad to see we got the ball rolling a little bit ... we got the bad taste out of our mouths," said Matsook, referring to losing to cross-river rival Monaca the last week of the regular season.

That loss made Rochester the No. 4 seed in Class A and put the Rams on Clairton's side of the bracket. Avonworth and Monaca will tangle in the other semifinal, but some fans are saying the Clairton-Rochester game is for the WPIAL title.

Matsook isn't one of those. He just hopes the Rams get off to a fast start against Clairton and don't have any mistakes.

"You play the game and don't get caught up in all the outside things and that's what we've done the past couple of weeks," he said. "That's what we didn't do [against Monaca]. We got caught up in the emotional part of it."

It's the little things, or in the Rams' case the little players, that make a difference.Unbeaten Clairton again ahead as roadblock for RochesterThe game

• What: Clairton (11-0) vs. Rochester (10-1).

• When: 7:30 p.m. tomorrow.

• Where: Dormont Stadium.

• The skinny: Rochester's loss came against rival Monaca. The Rams are in the WPIAL Class A semifinals for the eighth time in nine seasons. The Bears defeated Rochester in a quarterfinal last year, 20-19, and then lost to Springdale in the semifinals.