Wednesday night at Catasauqua’s Alumni Field, the Northwestern defense was so good that the only way Palisades could score a goal was to put it in their own net.

The third goal of the game went up on the scoreboard when the ball glanced off a Palisades player in front of the net and into the goal, giving Northwestern a 3-0 lead at the time.

Later, the Tigers added a couple more goals the conventional way, and won its Colonial League semifinal matchup against the Pirates 5-0 to advance to the league championship game on Saturday.

The two teams have developed somewhat of a history over the past few months. They met in the Summer League championship, which was won by Northwestern, and followed that up with a contentious regular season meeting won by Northwestern.

This game had all of the physical play of the two previous meetings.

Although Northwestern scored five goals – four on its own – it was the defense that completely commanded the Pirates. Palisades had one spurt of opportunities midway through the first half, but were unable to connect on any shots. Goalie Dean Carl came up with two key saves and watched as other shots went over the crossbar or wide of the posts. Many times the defenders in front of Carl took the ball away from Palisades players before they could even get any opportunity to take a shot.

“They like to play the ball long, and that gave us a bit of a problem for a while, but we stepped it up,” said senior defender Austin Bittenbender. “Our communication has been really important for our success. We’ve also played together a lot, so we have gotten used to each other and that helps make it easier.”

The shutout was the eighth of the season, and the second in a row in the league playoffs where the Tigers have outscored their two opponents 12-0.

“I loved how our defense looked tonight. We were aggressive, we were sound on the ball; we had a couple of missteps where we came out and may have been a little too aggressive. We always preach pressure coverage in the back, and the intensity there was phenomenal. The back-to-back shutouts speak for themselves as to how well our defense played.”

With 15 minutes of the first half gone, the offense used a crossing pass from Caelan Stangil that connected with Cole Mertz, who headed the ball past goalie Mason Bauer for a 1-0 lead. Stangil added his own goal to the mix when Mertz played a corner kick into Logan Mesics who found Stangil in front of the net for a 2-0 advantage.

After the Palisades miscue among a crowd of players in front of the goal made it 3-0, Mesics went from assisting to scoring when Lyle Good got the ball to him to make it 4-0 at halftime.

The second half was a display of strong defense, with neither team able to score, although Northwestern controlled play. Bauer made a pair of good saves and just as Palisades had done earlier, Northwestern players were just a little off target with their shots and unable to get a fifth goal.

With 6:29 left, frustration got to Palisades and Stangil was pulled down in the box and awarded a penalty kick. Faking Bauer out to dive to his right, Stangil buried his shot to Bauer’s left for the 5-0 lead.

“The ball was kind of bouncing around in a weird way, and I got a touch on it and the goalie just took me down,” said Stangil of the penalty. “Right before the kick, I just look at the goalie and think where he’s going to go and just try to slide the shot the other way.”

FREE SOCCER … The other semifinal saw Moravian and Southern Lehigh, the two teams that took Northwestern to overtime this season, battling at Salisbury High School. The Spartans came out on top 2-1, and will meet the Tigers Saturday afternoon at 1 p.m. back in Catasauqua for the league title. The last four league championships have been won by either Northwestern or Southern Lehigh, with each team claiming two championships. Northwestern is the defending league champion.

Northwestern 5, Palisades 0

Palisades 0 0 - 0

Northwestern 4 1 - 5

Goals: Palisades – none; Northwestern – Stangil (2), Mertz, Mesics; Saves: PAL – Bauer (2); NW – Carl (2).

Records: PAL 15-4-1; NW 19-1-0