PARKLAND - Northwestern finds itself in a familiar spot - playing for a Colonial League championship.

The Tigers earned that opportunity by beating Notre Dame 5-3 on Tuesday at Parkland High School.Jake Augustus threw a complete game for the Tigers as he settled in comfortably after giving up runs in the first two innings.Augustus got plenty of support from his teammates, who put together a four-run bottom of the second to overcome the early deficit."That was tremendous," said Augustus. "Going out there having a three-run lead was incredible and I was thinking 'I've got a solid defense behind me, and if we keep swinging, they aren't catching us.'"Figuring on a close game, coach Northwestern Duran Porrino looked to simply come back from a 2-1 deficit when Tyler Wiik singled to lead off the inning and he had Niko Fager bunt him over to second base. Jake Haas delivered an RBI double and Zach Stanley singled to put runners on the corners with one out. One out later, Tyler Schreiner hit a shot into the left-center field gap for a triple, making it a 4-2 game. When Brady Mengel followed with a base-hit to score Schreiner, the Tigers had stretched their lead to three runs."My eyes definitely got bigger," said Schreiner about seeing the pitch come in. "I was just hoping that I wouldn't swing and miss it."Throughout the game, Northwestern peppered the gaps to keep constant pressure on the Crusaders. The gap-hitting was no accident, but was part of the game plan for Northwestern coming into the game."The approach was excellent. All day yesterday in practice, that's all we talked about was approach, approach, approach, approach," said Porrino. "We preached having our guys go the other way, because we knew that was where they were going to throw it, so that tells you that they're mentally into the game."They knew what pitch they were going to get and they did exactly what they were supposed to do in that situation."Notre Dame took a 1-0 lead in the top of the first, but Northwestern came back in the bottom of the inning to tie the game. Augustus kick-started the offense with a leadoff single. A fielding error by Crusaders' pitcher Steven Luke put runners on first and second with nobody out. One out later, Trevor Schreiner drove in the first Tigers run with a groundball to second to tie the game.The Tigers played for the Colonial League title last season, but lost to Saucon Valley 3-2. This year, Northwestern looks to take the next step and finish with a league championship.Augustus, who will be moving on to play baseball at Winthrop University in South Carolina, sees a definite reason why this year's team can come away with that elusive championship."Heart. Brady [Mengel] and I are both seniors this year and this is a huge season for us," said Augustus. "We're going to college to play college baseball, so we want to be remembered here. We all want to be remembered"We're all close this year and I love it."TITLE MATCHUP ... Northwestern will face unbeaten Bangor (21-0) on Thursday at 7 p.m. at Parkland for the CL title. The Slaters downed Southern Lehigh, 10-0, in Tuesday's other semifinal game.RECORD UPDATE ... The Tigers improved to 17-4 with the victory. Notre Dame drops to 17-5Notre Dame 110 010 0 - 3 7 1N'western 150 000 x - 5 6 1S. Luke, J. Heman (3) and K. Dadio; J. Augustus and T. Wiik; W - Augustus. L - Luke.