Emmaus (5-5)

Emmaus (5-5)

at

Valley West (7-3)

7 p.m. today

Eastern Conference 4A Semifinal

The Coaches: Emmaus' Joe Bottiglieri (73-50, 11th year); Valley West's Pat Keating (29-14, 4th year)

Last Meeting: first meeting

All-Time Series: first meeting

Quick Fact: Emmaus won the Eastern Conference Class 4A championship in 2010.

What's At Stake: The winner plays the winner of the East Stroudsburg North at Nazareth game for the title. Valley West will host the title game if it wins. Emmaus will be on the road if it wins.

Scouting Emmaus: The Hornets' record might be a bit deceiving. They lost to powerful Easton 15-14 in two overtimes and 24-22 to Bethlehem Liberty.

Emmaus has struggled in the first half over its last four games, totaling just 17 points by halftime. And 14 of them came in a 35-14 victory over Nazareth. QB Andrew Kerson went over 1,000 yards passing last game and has thrown nine TD passes. RB Wyl Miller leads a rushing attack with just under 500 yards.

Scouting Valley West: Since essentially being bounced from district contention with a 38-15 loss to Stroudsburg, the Spartans have run roughshod over four opponents. They weren't top competition, but it showed they didn't mail it in at 3-3.

Valley West has been leaning heavily on the running of RB Derrick Simms and QB Mike Baur during the streak. FB Brett Good has two rushing TDs in the last three games. WR Lucky Williams has caught a TD pass in each of the last four games and WR Josh Ortiz is making big plays again.

What To Expect: Tough game to call. Valley West is favored, but hasn't always played well in the Eastern Conference playoffs.

-- John Erzar