The game of football has evolved in recent years ... even at the high school level. A good chunk of the foot has been taken out and replaced by the arm. With all the passes that teams throw these days, maybe the game should be called "armball."

Lancaster Catholic quarterback Kyle Smith set the career passing yardage record for the state this season in leading his team to the PIAA Class AA title. He broke the mark of Downingtown East's Pat Devlin that was set in 2005. Evan Kraky of Lakeland had the record before Devlin and set it in 2001.

Notice a trend here? Within a nine-year span the state high school passing record was set three times. Footballs have been flying in the 2000s.

Ah, but there is one place where running with a football tucked under an arm still is en vogue. That place happens to be western Allegheny County and Beaver County.

High school teams in the PG West's coverage area really liked to run the ball this season.

Just take a peek at the statistics for six of the running backs on this year's PG West Fabulous 22 all-star team. Two of them -- Rushel Shell of Hopewell and Mike Caputo of West Allegheny -- ran for more that 2,000 yards. They were the top two rushers in the WPIAL during the regular season. Another back, Cody Cook of Beaver Falls, finished the season just 80 yards short of 2,000 and surpassed the 4,000-yard mark for his career.

Shell, who is only a sophomore, is on the West Fab 22 for a second consecutive year and could become the WPIAL's all-time leading rusher before his high school career is ended. Caputo, who is a junior, had a spectacular season for West Allegheny and was one of the reasons the Indians won the WPIAL Class AAA title.

Twelve schools are represented on this year's PG West Fab 22, with West Allegheny and Hopewell, who met at Heinz Field in the Class AAA title game, landing three players each on the squad. There is also a specialist, a kicker, on this year's Fab 22 in Bishop Canevin's Drake Greer. Check out his statistics.

Players are considered the "the best 22" regardless of position or a school's classification and were selected by the Post-Gazette's scholastic sports staff based on writers' observations, interviews with coaches, examination of statistics and balloting for all-conference teams. Players from Chartiers Valley were considered for the PG South Fab 22 and those from Quaker Valley were considered for the PG North Fab 22.

There are six repeat performers on the West team: Shell, Cook, Center's Preston Dawson, Aliquippa's Stanley Pugh and Andrew Carswell and Paul Jones of Sto-Rox.

No coach of the year is selected for the PG West Fab 22, but if there was, Bob Palko of West Allegheny would not be a bad choice. The Indians were expected to be OK in the Parkway Conference but turned out to be a little better than just OK.

-- By Rich Emert

Mike White's "High School Sports Edition" videos are featured exclusively on PG+, a members-only web site from the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette. Our introduction to PG+ gives you all the details.