Parkland boys lacrosse head coach Brad Schifko could be heard in the post-game huddle telling his players that nobody outside of their program had any faith in them or believed that they would win.

But high-intensity play on both ends of the field led the Trojans to a 12-7 win against top seed Easton Tuesday night in the District 11 semifinal at Northampton Area High School’s Al Erdosy Stadium.

It was the second win for Parkland in the district tournament, after falling in their first game last year. They took down rival Emmaus 14-6 last Thursday in the quarterfinal round.

“We came in here with no pressure at all,” said Parkland senior goalie Joey Stevenson. “We knew we could win. We showed the whole district, the whole Lehigh Valley, and probably the whole state.

“After the loss to Central in the EPC playoffs, it was a wakeup call. We had a rough practice the next day, but we worked hard to get the next win. We didn’t want the season to end.”

From the opening faceoff it was apparent that the Trojans were ready for this game, and wanted to win.

Sophomore Brady Groff opened up the scoring on the first shot of the game just 1:08 in. Gavin Saylor, Dru Miller, and Ian O’Neill joined in on the scoring and with a little over five minutes left in the first quarter, Parkland held a 4-0 lead, and all of the momentum.

Just as it looked as if this was going to be a blowout, the Eastern Pennsylvania Conference champs quickly got three back on their first three shots, and trailed 4-3 after one.

James Cipolla scored twice in the second quarter, and O’Neill and Miller each added one as the Trojans held an 8-5 advantage at halftime.

“We put in a completely new offense that we had been working on in practice,” said Ryan Geroulo. “We’ve been running something all year and then changed it up for tonight, and they didn’t see it coming.”

Geroulo had his hands in a big third quarter for Parkland where they outscored Easton 4-1 and seized control. All that was left was to pass around the ball and keep possession to let the clock wind down.

“We’ve been practicing all week for them,” Stevenson said. “We knew what they could do and so we went out and executed. We grinded and grinded at practice until we perfected our game plan. I think we had it going for us tonight.”

There is one more game the Trojans have their eyes on, a district final. Parkland (15-5 overall) will square off with Southern Lehigh, a 10-9 semifinal winner over Central Catholic in overtime. These two teams met on May 3 with the Spartans getting the better of the Trojans 14-13.