Dino Nadarevic’s WPIAL, PIAA sweep headlines year in Gateway sports

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Sunday, June 22, 2025 | 11:01 AM

Chaz Palla | TribLive Gateway’s Dino Nadarevic wins the discus during the PIAA Class 3A track and field championships May 24, 2025 at Shippensburg University.

Dino Nadarevic was to throw the shot put and discus one more time in a high school event last Thursday and Friday at New Balance Nationals before transitioning to a new journey at Duquesne.

It was the culmination of a high school career that began in obscurity but with promise two years ago and blossomed into one of the most decorated in Gateway history.

He celebrated last month with two WPIAL and two PIAA championships.

Nadarevic turned away all the challengers at Shippensburg on May 23-24, winning the shot put with a top distance of 58 feet, 8.5 inches before claiming the discus with a best attempt of 180-2.

“I knew it was my last state meet, and I wanted to make the best of it, and I did,” Nadarevic said after returning from Shippensburg with the first-place hardware.

Nadarevic first set the school record in the discus with a 172-3 in an early season tri-meet with Connellsville and Hempfield and added to it before WPIALs.

At Slippery Rock, he won the discus by 20 feet, finishing with a top throw of 187-0.

He fell just short of his goal of also setting a school record in the shot, but his best throw at WPIALs was the competition’s best as he unleashed a winning toss of 59-1.

The future Gateway Sports Hall of Fame inductee is the final athlete to represent the Gators in a 2024-25 academic year filled with many special Gateway moments.

Gateway boys tennis golden this spring

Not often does one WPIAL tennis team sweep the singles, doubles and team titles in the same season.

But Gateway achieved that in Class 3A.

Senior Adam Memije claimed his first WPIAL singles crown after finishing runner-up last year. Senior Zidaan Hassan and junior Logan Memije defended their WPIAL doubles titles, and the Gators won their second team title in three years with a 3-2 triumph over WPIAL rival North Allegheny.

Hassan won his first doubles title with Adam Memije in 2023.

Gateway represented in all three PIAA tournaments in Hershey with Zidaan and Logan Memije capturing state doubles bronze for the second time.

Boys volleyball earns outright section title

With its win over Fox Chapel on May 8, the Gators wrapped up the Section 4-3A boys volleyball title with an 8-2 record.

While many in the program felt the team would receive a home playoff game for the WPIAL first round, the selection committee instead tabbed it as the No. 9 seed and sent it to Mt. Lebanon.

Coach Phil Randolph said he was pleased to see his team’s fight against the Blue Devils, but it was not able to pick up the win. Mt. Lebo prevailed 3-1 with set scores of 25-19, 16-25, 25-14 and 26-14.

Gateway finished its season at 10-3, and 6-foot-3 senior outside hitter Darious Farrar was selected to the All-WPIAL Class 3A second team. Seniors Owen Echegaray (libero) and Tom Nikou (setter) and junior Daniel Bozicevic (outside hitter) also received Section 4 first-team laurels.

Senior-laden boys bowling team excels

When the Gators punched their tickets to the boys bowling state championships in March by qualifying for the finals of the regional team tournament, they also knew they clinched a return trip to nationals in Indiana.

It was one final event in one of the most successful runs in the history of the Gators bowling program.

Seniors Allon Wallace Jr., Josh Zlokas, Landon Lohr, Joey Jurcak and Chris Roseberry, along with junior Chase Owens, finished 32nd at nationals in a talented field of 55 boys teams.

Wallace Jr. then took 40th out of nearly 400 who were in contention for the singles crown.

Girls flag football returns to playoffs

Five straight wins to cap the regular season propelled Gateway to the Pittsburgh Girls Flag Football League playoffs for the second year. The streak included a 7-0 victory over rival Plum to determine the final playoff berth from the East Division.

Gateway ended the regular season 8-3 and hoped for good things in the playoffs, but Woodland Hills ended those hopes with a 12-0 win in the first round.

Gateway’s three seniors, Kaitlyn Karpuszka, KC Glaze and Shavonne Williams, will play on collegiate flag teams.

Raymer makes swim finals at Bucknell

Hunter Raymer capped a successful high school swim career by representing the Gators in the finals of the Class 3A 200-yard individual medley and the 500 freestyle at the PIAA swim championships in March at Bucknell.

Raymer swam in the consolation final of the 200 IM on Day 1 and placed 14th overall with a time of 1 minute, 53.30 seconds.

He then came back on Day 2 and qualified for the consolation final of the 500 free. He placed 10th in his final high school race with a time of 4:34.19.

Raymer, the WPIAL champion in the 500 free as a freshman, will swim in college at Denison.

Football misses playoffs on committee decision

While the Gators didn’t finish with an automatic WPIAL Class 5A football playoff berth from the Big East Conference — those bids went to Woodland Hills, Penn-Trafford and Franklin Regional — they were in the mix for one of the three 5A wild card spots to be determined by the WPIAL playoff pairings committee.

Gateway tied Latrobe and Kiski Area for fourth in the conference at 2-4. In the end, the committee selected Latrobe for the playoffs, along with Moon and South Fayette from the Allegheny Six Conference.

It was a tough pill to swallow by coach Don Holl and his coaches and players who suffered one-point losses to Woodland Hills and Latrobe in their final two conference games.

Gateway, which finished 3-7 overall, also fell to Franklin Regional by just two points, 36-34.

Boys basketball clipped in WPIAL first round

Gateway’s Moon shot was unsuccessful as the homestanding Tigers, the No. 5 seed, topped the Gators, 49-42, in the WPIAL Class 5A boys basketball first round at Moon High School.

Gateway came into the playoffs with a high degree of momentum after closing the regular season with three straight wins and victories in eight of 10.

Gators coach Alvis Rogers said that he was surprised to see where his team landed as the No. 12 seed with how it played down the stretch in the regular season and its tie for second in Section 1 with Latrobe at 10-4 behind undefeated Uniontown (14-0).

Gateway hockey returns to varsity level

The Gators found a winning formula in their first season playing PIHL varsity hockey after several years growing the program at the JV level.

Gateway started out 0-6 as it settled into its season before winning four straight to get back in the Division II mix.

The Gators, led by 10 seniors, ended the regular season on a six-game win streak and clinched a playoff spot. Senior CJ Evans led the team with 43 points on 22 goals and 21 assists.

Their playoff experience didn’t last as long as they had hoped as powerful Morgantown stopped Gateway, 11-0, in the first round.

Boys soccer continues playoff streak

For the fifth straight season, the Gateway boys soccer team qualified for the WPIAL playoffs, this time after finishing tied for second in Section 1-4A with Central Catholic behind WPIAL power Plum.

The Gators entered the playoffs hoping to make some noise as the No. 9 seed, but No. 8 Canon-McMillan had other ideas on its home turf and jumped out to a 4-0 lead at halftime en route to a surprising 6-0 victory.

Gateway, led a senior group that included the likes of James and Nick LoCoco and Owen Echegaray, finished 8-8 overall and scored 47 goals in its 16 games.

Munyon represents at WPIAL cross country

Freshman Piper Munyon capped her first season with Gateway cross country with a personal-best time of 20 minutes, 7.5 seconds at the WPIAL Class 3A championships at White Oak Park.

The time placed her 43rd in a deep 3A field. She improved her time nearly 15 seconds from her first race at White Oak at the Tri-State championships a week earlier.

Girls volleyball a playoff qualifier

Gateway won eight Section 5-3A girls volleyball matches and finished third behind Indiana (12-0) and Greensburg Salem (10-2) in the section standings.

That finish lifted the Gators to the WPIAL tournament where they earned a tough draw against No. 1 Beaver in the first round.

Despite its best efforts, the Bobcats, the eventual WPIAL runner-up, scored a 3-0 win which concluded Gateway’s season at 9-6 overall.

Michael Love is a TribLive reporter covering sports in the Alle-Kiski Valley and the eastern suburbs of Pittsburgh. A Clearfield native and a graduate of Westminster (Pa.), he joined the Trib in 2002 after spending five years at the Clearfield Progress. He can be reached at mlove@triblive.com.

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