Player
of the Year!
Meet Oil City High School's
record-breaking Ethen Knox
an All-American, All-Stater
and Pa. Coaches 3A Select
His sensational junior season:
-
Max Preps Small Town All-American
-
All-USA Today Offensive team (25 players, all of whom nominated for Player of Year, which will be announced this summer
-
Mr. Pa Football Tremendous 25 (1A-3A)
-
Coaches Select 3A Player of the Year
-
Coaches Select 3A first team all-state
-
Pa. Football Writers 3A first team all-state
-
PennLive second team all-state (all classes)
-
Jim Kelly YDL sports network District 10 Player of the Year
-
Jim Kelly YDL sports network All-D-10
-
Erie Times News small school All-D-10
-
D-10 Offensive POY nominee by ETN
-
All-Region 4 first team RB/DB
-
Five-time Jim Kelly YDL Player of Week
-
Two national records with 3,705 yards rushing in a 10-game season and six 400-yard rushing games
-
OCHS single-season, career rushing records
-
42 touchdowns, 294 points, 63 tackles, 6 INTs
-
No. 100 in Prep RedZone Pennsylvania rankings for Class of 2024. Also No. 6 RB and No. 3 in District 10.
Most photos on this site by Richard Sayer, Eight&322.com
Prep RedZone recognizes Oilers' Knox, O'Dell
Ethen Knox (pictured) apparently is Pennsylvania's No. 1 underrated running back for the Class of 2024. A Prep RedZone article written by Pat Weider and released March 2 had this to say about the Oil City star:
"Knox plays in an old-school I offense (where) he was the featured running back...What stands out from Knox's film is how patient he is at running back. Several times he was given tosses or long handoffs and Knox was patient and waited for the blocks to be set up and then finally hit the hole. Once he hits the hole...is where Knox is special. He just explodes through it and runs through tacklers. He is also deadly in the open field. Once he gets into the open field, he is gone. Knox is also very good in the passing game because he has good hands and runs good routes. Knox is someone (who) with a big senior year should be recruited to play college football."
Prep RedZone ranks Knox No. 100 in the state for the class of 2024. One of his blockers, senior James O'Dell, is ranked No. 440. O'Dell (pictured) missed about the last two-thirds of the 2022 season with an injury. More than 500 players are ranked ad several more are placed on a "watch list."
Nick Krahe, the tackle from Harbor Creek who is headed to West Virginia, was ranked No. 21 in the Class of 2023. Oil City's Cam Crocker was 401 and Franklin's Drew Wilkinson was listed at 412.
And, just FYI, Khalon Simmons, the Meadville running back, was ranked 154 in the Class of 2023.
Crocker headed to West Point!
All-stater believed to be
first Oiler to play football for service academy
Cam Crocker announced Jan. 9 that he's headed to United States Military Academy at West Point where he will play football for the Black Knights.
He signed his letter-of-intent on Feb. 1.
It is believed Crocker, a 6-4, 285-pound tackle, will be the first Oiler to play football for a service academy!
LOOKING PROUD: The Crocker family of (from left) dad Mike, brother Brayden, Cam and mother Missy.
Cam Crocker is pictured at signing day festivities with (clockwise from upper left) assistant coaches Nate Neely and Dave Skinner and head coach Dan York (seated).
The file on the senior two-way lineman (6-4, 285) and tight end:
-
Pa. Football Writers all-state OL
-
Jim Kelly YDL network all-D-10 OL
-
Erie Times News small school all-D-10 OL
-
D10 Offensive POY nominee by ETN
-
Mr. Pa. Football Terrific 10 Linemen (1A-3A)
-
Region 4 first team OL/DL
-
Started a school record 42 straight games
-
Oilers averaged 323 yards rushing during his career
-
98 career tackles
But one visit was all it took.
Mike Kilroy of exploreVenango tells the story.
About This Site
If you are from Anywhere, USA, and happened to stumble upon this site, Franklin and Oil City are about eight miles apart along Route 8 in Venango County, Pa. -- which is about halfway between Pittsburgh and Erie in the western part of the state.
route8rivalry.com (formerly venangofootball.com) covers the grid doings of Oil City and Franklin high schools in Venango County. It also includes the football histories of the two schools, which date back to 1896, along with that of Venango Catholic (nee Christian and formerly St. Joseph in Oil City), which dropped the sport in the 1990s. VC has been in co-ops with Oil City and Franklin since then.
This is a Wix site with longtime but former Derrick sports editor Penny Weichel serving as webmaster. She is the former webmaster of ocpafootball.com and franklinpafootball.com, and most of the information found there can be found here. Also added in the last two years is basketball covering all five Venango County schools (Cranberry and Rocky Grove, too) along with some wrestling and swimming and other fall/spring sports.
Contact pennyweichel@outlook.com if need be.