“They kind of came out and punched us in the mouth,” said Northwestern center and linebacker Blaine Snyder about Scranton Prep. “But we really just put our foot down and didn’t let them get much more.”

The Tigers (14-0) returned fire and left the Tiger Stadium field for the last time this season with a 27-6 win over the Cavaliers and a berth in this weekend’s state semifinal.

Scranton Prep (12-2) used the opening drive of the game to march easily down the field to the Northwestern Lehigh 20-yard line before the Tigers defense bit down hard, forcing a turnover on downs when a fourth and four play was stopped cold.

Scranton got its only score of the game on its second drive of the game. After Northwestern went three-and-out, the Cavaliers started from their own 41 and quarterback Louis Paris broke through the middle of the Northwestern line to go 59 yards for the touchdown. The extra point was no good, leaving it a 6-0 game in favor of the Cavaliers.

The Tigers bounced back when Shane Leh hit Shane Hulmes with a seven-yard pass and Seth Kern added the extra point for a 7-6 Northwestern Lehigh lead with 11:52 left in the second quarter. Hulmes then went to work defensively when he recovered a fumble at the Tigers 42-yard line.

Six plays later, Clymer ran for his 27th rushing touchdown of the season as he went in from seven yards out and made it 14-6 in favor of the Lions.

“Our scout team does a great job of getting us prepared during the week,” said Snyder, crediting them with helping the Tigers to get settled in against Scranton.

To start the second half, it was the Northwestern offense that did the punching.

The Tigers went 70 yards in 12 plays and ate up over five minutes off the clock on their opening drive. Shane Leh hit Devon Hildebrand with a 27-yard pass down the middle of the field to get to the one-yard line. Hildebrand made the play by coming back to catch the pass that was slightly underthrown after being held up by the wind.

On the next play, Dalton Clymer finished off the drive by taking the direct snap and going just to the left of center to get the final yard. With 6:47 left in the third quarter, the Tigers had pushed their lead to 20-6 when Seth Kern added the extra point.

“That was big for us because we messed up a scoring opportunity late in the second quarter, so I told the guys at halftime that we had to come out and put together a drive,” said Tiger head coach Josh Snyder. “They did just what we needed them to do on that drive and ate up time and got us into the end zone. That was big for us.”

After Northwestern’s opening drive put them up 20-6, they closed out the scoring with 1:35 left in the game when Clymer went in from one yard out and Kern’s kick made it 27-6.

Knowing that the Cavaliers had to put the ball in the air, Eli Zimmerman pulled in his ninth interception of the season. Scranton Prep was then called for an unsportsmanlike conduct penalty that gave the Tigers the ball at the Scranton 35.

From there, Northwestern Lehigh was able run out the clock.

“Every week we have a great game plan and switch things up because everything can’t be the same,” said Hildebrand. “It’s thanks to the coaches that we can come up with things that work. We just play our tails off and this is the outcome. I love every one of these guys and I’m proud to be on this team. Just another day in the office as we say on the sidelines. We just treat every game as a normal game and go one at a time and move on.”

The Tigers will play District 3 champion Wyomissing next week after the Spartans beat Danville 48-27 in the other quarterfinal game. The game will be played Friday night at 7 at Kutztown University.