SLATINGTON - Northwestern has run past and shot over just about everyone it has played this year.

But on Wednesday in the District 11 Class AAA semifinals, the high-octane Tiger offense met its match.Allentown Central Catholic slowed the Northwestern transition game and harassed its perimeter attack.The resulting Tiger fuel shortage allowed Central Catholic to pull away for a 43-30 victory."Give Central Catholic credit, they played a very good defensive game," said Northwestern coach Chris Deutsch after seeing his team held to its lowest point total of the season. "Their man-to-man defense was the best we've seen this year."They were up tight on our shooters and contested all our shots. They also prevented us from getting anything in transition."Against a Northwestern team that entered the contest averaging over 53 points a game and that hadn't scored under 48 points in its last nine games, the Vikings' defensive performance was huge."Our defensive effort was the key." said veteran Central Catholic coach Mike Kopp. "The girls did a great job of executing our game plan."Northwestern likes to run the court and also shoot a lot of threes, so they were the two things we wanted to try and take away from them. I thought we did a nice job of controlling the tempo and also pressuring their three-point shooters."The Tigers did make five three-pointers in the game (5-for-22), but three of them came in a desperation late-game comeback bid. Even more telling was the fact that Northwestern had just two points in transition the entire game.Despite Northwestern's offensive woes, however, it was in the game the entire way."I thought our defense also played really well," said Deutsch. "We held them to 20 points through three quarters"But once their lead got to six points in the fourth quarter, we had to come out of our zone and play man … and with their size, that was a tough matchup for us."Northwestern's biggest lead of the night came early as it jumped ahead, 5-0. Central rallied for an 11-8 lead after one quarter on a three-point play by Emma Redding in the final minute.Defensive play dominated the middle quarters as the Vikings took a 20-16 edge into the final quarter."Some of the shots we hit all year, we didn't convert tonight," said Deutsch. "Part of that was Central Catholic's defense, but I thought we were a little anxious on the offensive end and rushed things."Our inability to get any offense generated took away one of our other weapons because when we couldn't score, we couldn't press."Leading 22-20 early in the final quarter, Central Catholic put together an eight-point run that appeared to finally break the game open. Alyssa Mack and Darcy Wolf had four points apiece during the spurt for the Vikings.But Northwestern (24-2) stormed back as Sabrina Mertz, Sarah Segan and Megan Landrigan all drilled three-pointers in a two-minute span that cut the Viking lead to 33-29 with 1:19 left.Any comeback hopes the Tigers still entertained were dashed seconds later when Olivia Roseman got loose for a breakaway layup. Roseman converted the shot and then made two free throws when the Tigers were called for an intentional foul on the play. Her four-point play stretched the lead back to 37-29 and put the game on ice.Deutsch said that despite the setback, it was a memorable season."I'm really proud of this team and our season," he said. "We achieved our No. 1 goal of winning the Colonial League title and we tied a school record for wins in a season."I thought we were a fun team to watch. We got great support and I think our players deserved it. It was an outstanding season."The Vikings (23-3) will meet Bethlehem Catholic on Saturday at Freedom High School for the district title.ACCRoseman 2-7-8-12, Bross 0-0-0-0, Mack 6-4-6-17, Redding 2-3-5-7, Arner 0-0-0-0, Wolf 1-2-2-4, Buckenmoyer 1-1-3-3. TOTALS: 12-17-26-43.NORTHWESTERNMertz 2-0-0-5, Landrigan 4-0-0-11, Day 0-0-0-0, Segan 1-5-6-8, Koenig 0-0-0-0, Bennett 0-0-0-0, Thomas 0-0-0-0, Cunningham 1-3-8-5, Anderson 0-1-2-1. TOTALS: 8-9-16-30.ACC 11 6 3 23 - 43Northwestern 8 5 3 14 - 30Three-pointers: ACC - Roseman 1, Mack 1. NW - Landrigan 3, Mertz 1, Segan 1.