Northwestern Lehigh, Palmerton will battle it out for the title again

The Northwestern Lehigh High School girls basketball team still has a three-peat in its sights following the Colonial League tournament semifinal round on Tuesday night at Catasauqua High School.

Paige Sevrain, Brook Balliet and Cara Thomas each scored seven points and the third-seeded Tigers never trailed in a 31-26 defeat of No. 2 Notre Dame-Green Pond.

In the nightcap and in the wildest and craziest playoff game in the 30-year history of the league tournament, top-seeded Palmerton beat No. 4 Pen Argyl 68-65 in three overtimes to advance to the final.

Bethie Morgan scored 25 points for the Blue Bombers, the third-highest output ever in a semifinal contest, and Hannah Barry added 24, which tied for the fifth-highest scoring semifinal game ever.

Ellie Wallbillich scored 25 points with six 3-pointers for Pen Argyl, which also ties for the third-highest scoring semifinal game ever and set a school record for highest scoring playoff game.

For the third straight season Northwestern Lehigh (23-1) meets Palmerton (20-3), this time at 6:05 p.m. Friday at Freedom High School, for the league championship.

The Tigers beat the Blue Bombers 40-38 in last season’s title game on a Sevrain layup with 20 seconds left to finish off an 18-point performance and give Palmerton its first league loss of the season.

In the 2021 title game Northwestern Lehigh won 49-35 for 20-year coach Chris Deutsch’s 300th career victory by outscoring the Bombers 25-4 in the second half.

The Tigers (23-1) are seeking their sixth Colonial League title, all coming under Deutsch, who has won more titles (five) as a coach and has the most league victories than any coach in the 48-year history of the Colonial League.

The Tigers won a Centennial League title in 1977 and then went 29 seasons before winning their first Colonial League title.

After the Tigers won their school-record 22nd straight game, Deutsch looked ahead.

“Bethie Morgan is an outstanding ball player for Palmerton,” Deutsch said. “They are playoff battle tested with a lot of experience and have very good guard play.”

Northwestern Lehigh and Palmerton split two regular-season games this season when the Bombers won 33-30 on Dec. 6 and the Tigers won 43-40 on Jan. 26. Palmerton has won three Colonial League titles but none since 1998 while also winning seven championships in the Centennial League.

“We’re looking forward to playing Northwestern,” Palmerton coach Dan Beck said. “They have a great team and are wellcoached. We split in the regular season so it’ll be interesting to see what happens.”

Pen Argyl fell behind 31-23 after a 3-pointer by Morgan was followed by two from Barry. The Bombers still led 38-30 when the Green Knights scored 13 straight points to take a 43-38 advantage midway through the fourth quarter.

Pen Argyl upped the lead to 47-40 before Palmerton came back to send the game into a first overtime on Barry’s 3-pointer with 38 seconds remaining. Freshman forward Courtney Connell banked in a foul-line jumper before Macy Kotilka’s inside bucket with 40 seconds left sent the game to the second overtime.

Palmerton took the biggest lead of the second OT, 60-57, with 10 seconds left before Wallbillich nailed a 3-pointer with two seconds remaining to send the game to a third overtime for the third time in tournament history.

Wilson needed three overtimes to beat both of its opponents to win the 2003 title.

Hannah began the third OT with her 6th 3-pointer of the game and Palmerton went on to lead 65-60. But, of course, the Green Knights wouldn’t roll over and missed a 3-pointer in the final seconds that could have sent the contest into its fourth overtime.

“This feels great,” Palmerton coach Dan Beck said. “We had more than a couple of chances to put this game away but we were not patient enough with the ball. Give Pen Argyl credit. They gave us all we could handle.”

The Green Knights (19-5) entered the semifinal game with 12 straight victories, which is the longest winning streak in school history in the modern era and are two wins away from tying the school record of 21 wins in a season.

Palmerton also beat the Green Knights in a close game in the regular season, 49-46, on Dec. 8.

“We played our hearts out,” second-year Pen Argyl coach Todd Oessenick said after the program’s biggest game in decades. “And we worked our tails off. The game was just incredible. We came up one possession short. One 3 short.”

Senior guard Nina Miller hit a 3-pointer on her second shot of the game to begin the fourth quarter to give Northwestern a 24-16 lead in the first game of the night.

“I thought that was a really key shot for us,” Deutsch said. “It was a hard fought game and that shot was huge to give us a nice lead. We knew we would need some girls to step up and make big plays tonight and that was one of them.

“This has been the hallmark of our team,” said 19-year Notre Dame coach Josh Kopp, who has the second-most Colonial League coaching wins of all-time. “Clearly we struggle offensively but our defense and tenacity and will to win is what’s been real key for us this season.”