You can call them opportunistic. Northwestern took advantage of early mistakes by Salisbury and came away with a 27-14 win over the Falcons in the District 11 semifinal game at Tiger Stadium.

On the opening drive, it was a bad snap on a punt that wound up netting just six yards to give the Tigers good starting position, which led to an early 7-0 lead.

On their next possession, which also ended with a punt attempt, Dylan Lobach broke through to block the punt, leaving the Tigers with a first-and-goal at the Salisbury five-yard line, which was quickly swallowed up by Harry Hall for a 14-0 lead.

The problems didn’t stop with the punting. On the very next drive, Salisbury’s Tevon Weber looked to throw deep into a stiff wind and had the pass intercepted by Trevor Cunningham. That turnover led to a 25-yard field goal by Brandon Miller to put the Tigers up 17-0.

“Those big plays were big for us, especially coming so early, because it gave us that momentum,” said quarterback Dylan Snyder. “We look to make things happen and that gave us a lot of momentum.”

The Northwestern offense showed somewhat of a new wrinkle, using Snyder’s legs even more than usual on offense and handing the ball off to Joe Colucci a season-high 11 times. The change was necessitated by leading rusher Harry Hall being hampered by a sore ankle. The result was someone other than Hall leading the team in rushing for the first time this season. That honor went to Snyder, who ran for 172 yards on 20 carries.

“Harry hurt the ankle against Northern Lehigh and he’s still battling it,” said Northwestern head coach Josh Snyder. “You could see there were times when he had trouble making a cut, so it was a good night to get other players involved in the offense.”

Things finally turned around for Salisbury after Miller’s field goal.

Devin Irwin took the ensuing kick-off and ran it back 86 yards for Salisbury’s first score of the night, making it a 17-7 game.

Northwestern got the ball back with 8:23 left in the half and put themselves in a first-and-goal from the seven, but again, things went right for the Falcons, whose defense came up big and stopped the drive, tackling Hall for a two-yard loss on the final play of the half.

“I don’t know what it is about Salisbury, but nobody has played us as hard down close as they have this year,” said Josh Snyder. “They stopped us in the first game and they did it again tonight. You have to hand it to them, because that would have been big for us to get that score.”

Dylan Snyder scampered 45 yards on a keeper in the third quarter for his second touchdown and Miller added a 26-yard field goal into the stiff wind to put the Tigers up 27-7. Salisbury didn’t go quietly, as Weber connected with Mason Donaldson for a 45-yard touchdown strike with just under six-minutes to play in the game to make it 27-14.

Miller’s two field goals gave him the school record for field goals in a season (7) and also made him Northwestern’s all-time leader in field goals attempted (147), field goals made (123) and scoring by a kicker (156 points), surpassing Jordan Grube in those categories. Grube played at Northwestern from 2001-2003 and went on to a college career at Muhlenberg.

The win sends the Tigers into a rematch with the Notre Dame (Green Pond) Crusaders next week in their attempt to repeat as District 11 Champions. Notre Dame downed North Schuylkill 35-15 in the other Class AA semifinal. Notre Dame downed Northwestern 31-19 in the opening week of the season.