First impressions can last a lifetime or, in the case of high school athletics, an entire season.

After a 2-0 victory in a scrimmage against Pine-Richland, Norwin assistant coach Ashley Weimer knew how talented of a team the Knights had.

And Weimer knows a thing or two about talented Norwin teams.

She was a freshman starter on the Knights' 1997 WPIAL championship team.

That impression this year's team made on Weimer proved to be true. Norwin finished the regular season 14-3-1 and finished second to Penn-Trafford in Section 1-AAA.

In the WPIAL playoffs the Knights shut out Belle Vernon Area, 3-0, in the first round before pulling off the upset of the playoffs thus far with a 1-0 win against top-seeded Moon Area.

"They were very excited entering that game," Weimer said of the quarterfinal showdown with Moon. "At that point they still had a lot to prove. I don't think that we had many fans who thought we could do well, but we knew it all along."

Senior striker Dana DelleFemine scored on a header with 14 minutes left to play to lift Norwin to the quarterfinal upset. It was the first loss of the season for Moon and only the second goal it had allowed all season.

"Since that [scrimmage] against Pine-Richland, I was telling them this is a WPIAL championship [quality] team," Weimer said.

"I think actually the season-defining moment was the scrimmage against Pine-Richland. I realized what we had to work within terms of the talent level. Moon was just a repeat of the Pine-Richland game. We dominated both games."

Although Norwin certainly had the makeup of a WPIAL champion, its WPIAL playoff run came to an end in the semifinals, a 2-1 loss to Peters Township.

By advancing to the WPIAL Class AAA semifinals, Norwin qualified for the PIAA playoffs for the second consecutive year. The PIAA playoffs began Tuesday and Norwin routed City League champion Schenley, 7-0.

Norwin advances to play WPIAL champion Seneca Valley at 1 p.m. tomorrow at North Allegheny's Newman Stadium.

After a four-year career at Norwin and four years playing at West Virginia University, Weimer is now an assistant on the staff of first-year coach Danielle Baginski. Last season Baginski was coaching Erie McDowell.

In a near identical scenario last season, Norwin defeated Moon, 1-0, to advance to the WPIAL semifinals where it was defeated by Mt. Lebanon, 2-1. In the state playoffs Norwin lost in the first round, 1-0, to the Baginski-coached Erie McDowell team. Still residing in Erie, Baginski makes the 4 1/2-hour round trip daily to attend practices and games.

The WPIAL title hopes are gone for Norwin but Weimer said she sees a lot of similarities in this current group of players to her teammates in 1997.

"The difference between teams when I played and teams now is the overall talent and depth of the team," Weimer said.

"We are a lot deeper and there is a lot more talent this year. The older teams were relatively more blue collar and scrappy. They played with a lot more heart. That has been the culture at Norwin and I don't want them to get away from that."

The Knights have been led this season by the midfield trio of Elizabeth Debo, Alyssa Liebdzinski and Maria Lanyi. DelleFemine is the top forward on the team along with Molly Peddicord.

Defensively Marisa Czapor and Sam Vasy are the stalwarts on the back line that played a part in 10 shutouts this season.

The good news for Baginski and Weimer is that Debo, Liebdzinski and Lanyi are all juniors and Peddicord is a sophomore.

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