CENTER VALLEY — “The story of the day was we played bad defense.”

That was Northwestern head coach Brian Polaha’s description of his team’s performance against Southern Lehigh in the Colonial League championship game.

On Thursday evening at Weiland Park on the campus of DeSales University, the Tigers and Spartans completed another chapter in their history as league rivals.

For Northwestern, the stage turned out to be too bright, as subpar defense by its standards and its inability to capitalize offensively came back to hurt it in the end.

Southern Lehigh took advantage of the miscues, and received hits when it needed to win 8-3 and claim its fourth Colonial League title in program history.

Things looked promising for the Tigers in the first inning when Southern Lehigh starting pitcher Gabe Moscato struggled to find the strike zone early. Two walks and two hit batters pushed a run across, but Northwestern couldn’t add to its early lead as Moscato worked out of the jam.

In the second, Southern Lehigh used a Tigers’ error and a Mason Schwartz RBI single to tie the game.

Aiden Freeman put Northwestern back in front in the third with an RBI single, but Josh Farber was thrown out at the plate to end the inning and end another chance to add on.

The mistakes finally caught up to Northwestern in the fourth as the Spartans tied the game and took a 5-2 lead.

First, it was a miscommunication that allowed Dylan Smith to advance to third on a sacrifice bunt, and then score on an RBI single by Matt Edwards. Then a two-out walk and error loaded the bases for Southern Lehigh. Lastly, Matt O’Neill cleared the bases with a double just out of the reach of a diving Eli Zimmerman in center field.

Now trailing, the Tigers faced an additional challenge as Moscato had settled in despite his shaky start. After throwing 33 pitches in the first, Moscato only threw 45 through the next four — including under 10 in three of them.

“He was awfully nervous in the beginning, but to get out of that inning with one run pretty much saved the rest of the game for us,” said Spartan head coach Todd Miller about Moscato’s performance. “He battled the rest of the game. He didn’t have great stuff, but he kept competing.

“Some of the coaches wanted to get him out of there after the fourth, but I had confidence in him to run us through the fifth, and that was huge.”

Through five, Moscato struck out two, and allowed only three hits as he got help from his defense when he needed it.

The same could not be said for the Tigers’ Freeman. After an RBI double from Brady Zimmerman cut the deficit to 5-3 in the sixth, Northwestern’s defense struggled once again.

With two outs in the bottom of the frame, another error and a passed ball led to two more Spartan runs. Moscato added an RBI single to expand the lead.

Despite battling on the mound, Freeman’s night was done, and coach Polaha put none of the blame on him.

“I thought Aiden deserved a much better fate,” said Polaha. “They hit some balls that we should have easily fielded and we didn’t. A lot of their runs were unearned.”

However, the Tigers didn’t go down quietly as they loaded the bases in the seventh, but couldn’t get any runs across. It was only fitting that the final out came on a strikeout that eluded Solehi’s catcher, but Watson Church was forced out at home plate trying to score.

The disappointment could be felt around Northwestern and its coaching staff, knowing one of its worst games of the season happened to be in the championship game. Through it all, Coach Polaha is already preparing his team for the district playoffs next week.

“We normally make pretty easy plays, but we booted it around, we threw it, and we didn’t catch it,” he said. “It was bad. It was not our best effort. We have districts coming up next week so we’ll hopefully get back after it, work hard, and be ready.”

TIME TO PREPARE … Northwestern will get a bye to the semifinals in the Class 4A district playoffs, where it will face the winner of Saucon Valley and Lehighton on Sunday, May 25.

ANOTHER PRIZE … Southern Lehigh moves to the top seed in 5A. The Spartans will play the winner of Blue Mountain and Bangor on Saturday, May 24 in the semifinals.

Northwestern 101 001 0 - 3 5 5

Southern Lehigh 010 403 x - 8 5 1

Freeman, Church (6) and Fitch; Moscato, Fritts (6) and Pryzuski. W - Moscato. L - Freeman.

Records: Northwestern (18-5); Southern Lehigh (18-5).