There was a little bit of bad luck as the bounce of a ball fell in the wrong direction for the Parkland High School boys lacrosse team as it fell to Allentown Central Catholic 17-16 in overtime in an Eastern Pennsylvania Conference semifinal last Wednesday night at Northampton High School’s Al Erdosy Stadium.

It was the second straight one-goal game for the second-seeded Vikings over the third-seeded Trojans in as many weeks as CCHS won 14-13 on April 29, in the regular season.

Parkland had two separate, four goal leads in the third quarter, but Central took a late lead before Colton Arezzi tied the game at 16-16 with just 6.6 seconds left in regulation to force overtime.

In the extra period, the Vikings won the faceoff and took a time out shortly after. After an initial CCHS shot got deflected near the cage, Jack Restino scooped up the ground ball and sent home a shot that Andrew Matulevicius was unable to get to and the Vikings were able to storm the field in celebration of victory.

Senior Parker Kusko found the back of the net to stretch Parkland’s lead to 14-10 with 3:16 left in the third before Central Catholic scored four unanswered. The score was again tied 15-15 with 9:35 to go in regulation and then the Vikings scored to take the one goal lead with 2:20 to play.

Arezzi paced the attack with six goals and Kusko finished with four. Both John Gerancher and Blake Finnegan tallied two goals and each of Mazz Afif and Danny Tapia added a goal to round out the scoring. Matulevicius made 12 saves in net.

The Vikings took on the top seed, Easton, in the championship game this past Tuesday night. The Trojans will now focus on the upcoming District 11 3A Tournament and is set to take on Freedom in the quarterfinal round Thursday night at home. The Trojans defeated the Patriots 12-6 in the regular season back on April 1.