On Feb. 11, 1996, Chris Heery proposed to his then girlfriend at center court of the Northwestern Lehigh gymnasium while he was an assistant coach for the Tigers.

Twenty-seven years later to the date, Heery was back in the same gym as the head coach of Northern Lehigh as the Bulldogs faced his former team in the quarterfinal round of the Colonial League playoffs.

Let’s just say the proposal went better than the game.

“It was nice to be home; I just wish they would have welcomed me better, that’s all,” said Heery after Northwestern (22-1) soundly defeated Northern Lehigh 45-23.

A pair of ankle injuries kept freshman Hannah Gober (4.6 points per game) and sophomore Cara Thomas (11.3 ppg) out of the lineup for the Tigers, but their next-girl-up philosophy overcame the deficit.

Sophomore Paige Bissell started in place of Thomas and finished with six points. Perhaps her most important basket was her first, which came just over one minute into the game and put the Tigers up 4-0.

“It helped me to calm down, and I think that it helped my team get some momentum,” said Bissell of her first basket. “I was a little nervous coming in because I knew I had a big role to fill because Cara is such a good player. You also have to credit the other girls that stepped up for us tonight.”

An 11-0 run that filled the final six minutes of the first quarter opened things up.

The run was all senior Paige Sevrain and Bissell. Sevrain scored eight of her 12 points during that run, and Bissell had the other three.

Northern Lehigh attempted to climb back into the game, but a salvo of three-pointers in the second quarter shut down the Bulldogs. Brook Balliet nailed a three to make it 20-3 with 4:48 left in the first half, and Nina Miller and Emma Freeman both hit on longballs to push the score to 31-11 at halftime.

“It was a good team win. I thought we got off to a good start,” said Northwestern head coach Chris Deutsch. “Paige Bissell did a great job because we haven’t started her all year, and she came off the bench and really did a nice job. We always tell the girls that it’s next girl up, and I thought Paige really stepped up for us.”

With the teams combining for just six points in the third quarter, the Tigers’ lead stood at 33-15 going into the final eight minutes. Deutsch cleared the bench in the fourth quarter, and freshman Riley McGinley continued to wield a hot hand by scoring eight points as the Tigers cruised to the win.

“We had a big contribution from everyone on the team; it wasn’t just a couple of girls tonight,” said Sevrain. “Everyone who got on the court did something to help whether it was scoring, rebounds, assists or just playing good defense.”

Sevrain led Northwestern (22-1) with 12 points, while McGinley and Miller both finished with eight. Northern Lehigh junior Aubrey Pollard - who scored 14 against Northwestern when the two teams met just eight days earlier - was held to seven this time and Katelyn Barthold finished with six. Pollard, unofficially, had 12 rebounds while Sevrain had nine.

Northern Lehigh (13-10) will return to the court in the district playoffs, while Northwestern will face Notre Dame Green Pond (17-5) at Catasauqua High School Tuesday in the league semifinals. The finals will be played Friday at Freedom High School.

ANKLE UPDATE ... Gober has missed two games with an ankle injury, and her status is not known for Tuesday’s game. Thomas suffered an ankle injury in gym class on Friday, and she is also questionable for Tuesday.

WHAT CHANGED? ... Originally, Northwestern had appeared to win the tiebreaker for a quarterfinal bye, but the fourth tiebreaker between the Tigers and Palmerton (19-3) was applying the District 11 power ranking formula to just the Colonial League portion of the schedule. The formula rewards wins against a team with a higher classification, which meant that Palmerton’s win over the Tigers counted more heavily than the Northwestern win over the Bombers since Palmerton is a 3A school and Northwestern is 4A.

NORTHERN LEHIGH

Whelan 0-1-2-1, Williams 1-1-1-3, K. Barthold 3-0-2-6, Pollard 3-1-2-7, Bosch 1-0-0-2, Tosh 0-0-0-0, D. Barthold 1-1-2-4, Peters 0-0-0-0, Richards 0-0-0-0, Snyder 0-0-0-0. TOTALS: 9-4-9-23.

NORTHWESTERN

Balliet 2-0-0-5, Miller 3-0-0-8, Bissell 2-2-4-6, Freeman 1-2-2-5, McGinley 3-0-0-8, Fenstermaker 0-0-0-0, Fisher 0-1-2-1, G. Gober 0-0-2-0, Conner 0-0-0-0, Sevrain 5-2-2-12, Reinhart 0-0-0-0. TOTALS: 16-7-12-45.

Northern Lehigh 2 9 4 8 - 23

Northwestern 15 16 2 12 - 45

Three-pointers: NL - D. Barthold 1; NW - Miller 2, McGinley 2, Balliet 1, Freeman 1.