It was a tale of two halves for Saucon Valley and Northwestern in their District 11 Class AA Boys Soccer Championship on Thursday night.

When the two 40-minute sessions were over, both teams talked about the hard play and how the second half turnaround by the Panthers was the difference in the 3-1 victory which advanced them to the PIAA playoffs next week."We used a new defense in this game that we hadn't used all year so it took a little bit of getting used to," said Saucon Valley head coach Mel Moyer III. "At halftime, my assistant coaches made some adjustments and cleaned it up."That defense combined with a hat trick by Zach Reichard, that included a go-ahead penalty kick with 27:20 left in the game, allowed Saucon Valley to rally for the victory. Richard now has 38 goals on the season and remains perfect on penalty kicks for the year.Northwestern head coach Nate Hunsicker thought one of the big reasons things turned around in the second half was the officiating. The Panthers were hit with three yellow cards in the first half, but with the game still physical, neither team saw one in the second half."The officiating made a giant difference in the second half, unfortunately, Hunsicker said after placing the second place medals around each players head. "It was a really competitive game. Even when they equalized, they missed a call on our end and it kind of led to a breakaway. But those things happen. The penalty kick was a bit of an egregious call in my opinion and that really turned the tables."But at the end of the day, we didn't finish our opportunities. "While it made a difference, was it the only factor? Absolutely not."Hunsicker told his team that they couldn't come out in the second half and play defensively and go into a shell."Preach, preach, preach as much as you want, they unfortunately came out that way," said Hunsicker. "And they came out that way a lot more than I would have wanted them to and that helped contribute to Saucon's first goal as well."Hunsicker did admit that he expected a physical game from Saucon Valley."The four years that I've been here it's been a giant rivalry," he said. "These are two of the upper echelon teams in the Colonial League battling for supremacy and two very talented teams. It's always very aggressive and very physical when we meet."Factor in that the Panthers were hungry to avenge their only loss of the season that was handed to them by the Tigers."I told our boys that we had to keep pushing the pedal to the medal," Hunsicker said. "One goal wasn't going to be enough. As well as we played defensively in the first half, they have two really good horses up top, so eventually one of them was going to find the net. We couldn't afford to back off."This was our game to win. After getting that first goal, all we had to do was come out and play smart soccer the rest of the way. Not to say we didn't do that, but we didn't close out that way."