ALLENTOWN - When one player is double-teamed, it is simple math to determine that someone else is left open.

Northwestern Lehigh computed that mathematical theory perfectly Tuesday night in the semifinal round of the District 11 Class 3A boys soccer playoffs, and it resulted in its first goal of the game.

The Tigers went on to defeat East Stroudsburg South by a 2-1 score and advanced to Thursday’s final, which will be played at Northern Lehigh.

The math problem came about with 26:56 left in the first half when Matt Johnson made an approach toward the net with the ball. As he usually does, Johnson drew double coverage, so rather than trying to beat two defenders, he simply found the open man, who in this case was Colin Coffield.

The pass to Coffield at the far post was perfect, and he easily beat goalie Collin McAllister to give Northwestern a 1-0 advantage.

Halloween may be over, but throughout the game, Coffield seemed to be haunting the East Stroudsburg South defense. Just 10 minutes after his goal, he put a shot just over the crossbar and was able to create a lot of havoc for the Cavaliers defense.

After missing part of the season with an injury, Coffield and fellow senior Mason Brensinger both returned to the lineup late in the year to make the Tigers healthy for the first time all season. Their return has given Northwestern the added firepower it needed to turn things around after an up-and-down regular season.

“We suffered a lot of adversity, but now we have a full, healthy team back together,” said Coffield. “It’s really all about melding together, and we have really done that super well.”

The second half started with Northwestern (15-4-1) holding a precarious one-goal lead and early into the second half, South had an excellent opportunity to tie the game when it was awarded a direct kick from close range.

Tobias Golab took the kick and put up a laser right on target for a goal, except for the fact that Mason Crocco, the Tigers goalie, was not going to give in and made the save to keep East Stroudsburg South scoreless. A brief time later, Jonathan Klu found an opening, but Crocco made another stop.

Coffield would make his presence felt again when he took a penalty kick awarded to the Tigers. Coffield made a nice fake to his right and shot the ball to the left, leaving McAllister out of position to make a save.

While the Tigers were now up 2-0, the added goal was not the nail in the coffin that they were looking for. Instead, the Cavaliers (12-7-1) put on some intensity and looked to make their comeback. Shortly after Coffield’s penalty kick, East Stroudsburg South was awarded a PK and Golab got it past Crocco to cut the lead to just one goal.

The Cavs played an intense final 20 minutes, but were unable to make anything happen against the Tigers defense and eventually ran out of time, ending their season with a 2-1 loss.

NEAR MISSES ... Northwestern Lehigh would have had a much easier win if not for McAllister’s play in goal. The junior goaltender made numerous saves, many of them showing off his athleticism. Nicholas Krum played a nice header that was stopped, and Jack Mauro put an absolute laser toward the goal that McAllister also turned into a nonevent. Crocco also played well again for the Tigers, as the goalies look to one-up each other with saves.

HERE WE GO AGAIN ... “We can’t get away from them, as much as we might want to,” said Coffield of Southern Lehigh (17-5-1), the Tigers opponent in the district finals. The two teams have become rivals because of the close, competitive games that they always play, along with the fact that they are often combatants in the Colonial League and District 11 championships. The most memorable game was in the 2019 district finals, when Jeff Garcia scored on a bicycle kick to give the Tigers gold medals with a 1-0 win. The Tigers bested Southern Lehigh 2-0 in the league finals this season.