Williams Valley running back Fletcher Thompson followed lead blocker Trevon Bair during Saturday night's victory over Pen Argyl. Thompson rushed for 126 yards and two touchdowns in the Vikings' 49-14 victory. (Photo by Charlie Roth).

WILLIAMSTOWN — Much anticipated, the rematch is set.

With a 49-14 semifinal victory over Pen Argyl on Saturday night at Viking Stadium, Williams Valley earned the right to meet rival Schuylkill Haven for the District 11 Class AA championship next Friday at 7 p.m. at Blue Mountain.

Top-seeded Schuylkill Haven, which reached the title game by cruising to a 53-14 semifinal victory over Executive Education Charter on Friday night, dealt the second-seeded Vikings (11-1) their only defeat of the season, 38-30, back in Week 6. On top of that, last season the Vikes defeated Haven for the district championship.

Williams Valley’s semifinal victory over the Green Knights was nothing short of a dominant display of ground-pounding football featuring the talents of junior quarterback Brady Shomper, freshman running back Fletcher Thompson and an offensive line that made everything possible.

“I think our offensive line played very well, and our backs have played good all year,” Williams Valley head coach Stephen Sedesse said. “If they can get it going early on, I think our line can establish dominance and our run game can really get going.

“Once we get it going, it opens up the pass, but we just wanted to run the clock and run the ball a lot.”

Both Shomper and Thompson took advantage of gaping holes opened up front, then both punished defenders when they reached the second level.

Shomper finished as the game’s leading rusher, carrying 18 times for 169 yards, including four touchdowns on runs of 1, 1, 16 and 49 yards. Thompson, the Vikes’ leading rusher on the season, toted 16 times for 126 yards, scoring twice on runs of 8 and 2 yards.

Only throwing seven passes, Shomper still hit for 107 yards, including a 29-yard touchdown to Kian Krzyzanowski. The TD catch was Krzyzanowski’s 17th of the season, breaking the Williams Valley single-season record of 16 previously held by Owen Daniel.

“Our goal was to win,” Shomper said. “We took what they gave us.

“We were able to run the ball very well, and I had to do what I had to do. They blocked amazing every single play and I couldn’t have asked for any better.”

For Sedesse, that ground attack, and particularly the running of Shomper, is a key to the Vikes’ success.

“It’s impressive to have a quarterback who wants to run the football as much as he does,” Sedesse said. “A lot of quarterbacks don’t want to run. They want to throw.

“All year long, he threw for 2,000 yards, but tonight we didn’t throw but maybe eight times. For him to be able to put his helmet on and be a leader, and continue to be a leader and get yards, hard earned yards, is big. He had a lot of broken tackles. He ran hard tonight.”

Despite the wide margin of victory, the Green Knights (5-7) kept it close enough through the first two quarters to remain in striking distance.

After Williams Valley scored on a 10-play, 60-yard drive to open the game, the Vikes quickly had an opportunity to add to that when they recovered a Pen Argyl fumble seven plays into the Knights’ first possession. However, driving down the field again, Williams Valley turned it over on a fumble and Pen Argyl took advantage.

Driving 70 yards in eight plays, a 1-yard run by quarterback Mason Soos knotted the score at 7-7.

Williams Valley added a pair of second-quarter touchdowns after that on runs by Shomper and Thompson, making it 21-7 at the halftime break.

Pen Argyl scored once in the third quarter on a 5-yard run by Caiden Faust, but two more touchdowns, one each by Shomper and Thompson, pushed the Vikings’ lead to 35-14 after three quarters.

Then in the fourth, the scoring push continued when Shomper ran for his fourth touchdown and connected with Krzyzanowski for a 29-yard touchdown for the game’s final score.

The focus for Williams Valley now switches to the championship battle with the rival Hurricanes.

“Now we’re gonna start looking into it,” Sedesse said. “Looking over our last game when we played against them, it was Week 6, that’s six weeks ago. Each team got a lot better. They’ve really owned it on their end.

“We know what they’re going to do, but it’s how are we going to be able to stop it. Hopefully, we don’t give up big plays. We just have to watch for the little wrinkles they put in. They got us on a wrinkle the first time around. We just have to be prepared and play disciplined football.”

For Shomper, the rematch and a chance at redemption has been something he’s thought about a lot.

“After that loss in the regular season, we knew we wanted to get to the point where we could play them again,” Shomper said.