Northampton's field hockey team can get to the mountain, but can't seem to reach the top as far as the Lehigh Valley Conference goes.

For the second-straight year, coach Kelly Backenstoe's team was eliminated in the LVC semifinals as the Kids fell 9-1 to the Emmaus powerhouse at Whitehall.

Emmaus, which beat Northampton 9-2 during the regular season, will take on Parkland in the championship game Thursday at Whitehall. Parkland, the LVC's North Division titlist, edged Liberty 2-1 in the other semifinal game.

Northampton, which entered the playoffs as the wild card team, is now 11-6-1 with a nonleague game with Pocono Mountain East later this week.

A Northampton win in that game could boost the Kids into the third or fourth seed in the District 11 tourney which begins next week.

"Emmaus was just too good tonight," said Backenstoe on Tuesday. "We made a good effort, but trailed 4-0 at halftime and there was no catching up."

Makenna Marhefka scored Northampton's lone goal on an assist from Amber Saylor.

"We were just outplayed. Our goalie (Shannon Dalton) made 17 saves, but we got only three corners and scored on one," Backenstoe said.

Northampton, which lost to Liberty in last year's LVC semifinal and lost to Emmaus two years ago in the championship game, must "tighten up on our defense" in the district tourney.

The Kids advanced to the playoffs last Thursday with a 2-2 tie against Nazareth. Both schools finished with 9-4-1 marks in the LVC but Northampton got the wild card spot but going 1-0-1 against Nazareth, while the Eagles were 0-1-1 against the Kids.

Taylor Kerbacher scored both goals with Megan Wiest assisting twice and Dalton had 15 saves in the game that was played in a constant downpour.

"At the start of the season, everyone thought we'd be rebuilding, but it actually turned out to be reloading as the girls filled our holes nicely," said Backenstoe.