It was Yogi Berra who made the famous statement, “It’s deja vu all over again.”

For Lehighton (5-5) and Blue Mountain, that statement has some meaning as the two clubs meet tonight in a District 11 Class 4A quarterfinal contest.

A year ago, the Indians were defeated in the regular season — only to pull off an upset in Orwigsburg in the district quarterfinals.

This year, Tom McCarroll’s club again fell to Blue Mountain (6-4) in Week 7. And once again, the two teams will be meeting in the opening round of the postseason at the Eagles Nest.

But as similar as this year is to last — and the Indians are hoping for the same result — there are significant differences for Lehighton.

“Last year we were playing good football, but as we prepared for Blue Mountain we still knew what happened in the regular season, and that was a good old-fashioned butt whipping (55-14),” said McCarroll. “Now, our kids look back at the regular season game and know we had a chance to win that game (49-34). We really had some serious self-inflicted things that happened to us.

“We feel really confident, the kids are really confident ... they know last year most people thought it was a longshot to go in as a seven seed and beat them. This year I think the kids feel they can play with this team. They don’t think it’s a shocking-the-world kind of situation. And they know they don’t have to play necessarily perfect football, either. They just have to be sound in their assignments. So even thought it’s deja vu in terms of who our opponent is from a year ago, I think the mindset is completely different.”

There are other differences. For one, the Indians have a better ground attack, averaging more yards per carry and boasting a 1,000-yard rusher in Lukas Croizier. The passing numbers of Jayse Lawrence are pretty similar, but the one glaring stat is the senior quarterback has thrown fewer interceptions, but just as many touchdowns.

“We scored first, and they matched us,” said McCarroll of this season’s matchup. “It turned into a situation where they were chasing us and then we made a few of those mistakes and then we couldn’t stop them ... we need stops defensively. We’re going to make some adjustments offensively to hopefully get the run game going. We’re also going to make some adjustments defensively to try and stop their run game because they did have two 100-yard rushers against us, and we know that can’t happen again.

Both Carter Smith (107) and Brody Foose (106) cracked the century mark in rushing yards during the Eagles win, while QB Cohen Kirby threw for 153 yards and two TDs.

“We’ve been in games,” said McCarroll. “We’ve competed. I understand we fell short in some of those. Our kids ... are going to show up and they’re going to compete no matter who the opponent is. Obviously the fact that they’ve faced Blue Mountain prior this season and played toe-to-toe with them, they feel really good about it. And so do the coaches. We’re excited for the opportunity.”