With Northwestern Lehigh and Palisades winning their Colonial League semifinal games at Cedar Crest College last week, the league finals were a rematch of last year’s championship. For the Tigers, the trip to the finals was the fifth straight as they looked for their third league title in five seasons.

The Pirates had other ideas though and even though Northwestern (21-2) had coasted to a perfect 17-0 league record during the regular season, Palisades (20-3) came out on top in the title game in a 2-1 pitcher’s duel at Patriots Park.

Northwestern’s Emma Freeman and Palisades’ Karlye Teman squared off in a meeting of two of the best pitchers in the league. Leadoff hitter Catie Russo started the game with a home run.

Northwestern’s demise didn’t come because of a long ball, but by a series of bunts that pushed across the winning run for Palisades.

After Russo’s home run, Freeman didn’t allow a hit until Brooklynn Lucas led off the sixth inning with a swinging-bunt single.

A passed ball moved Lucas to second before Jordyn Bonelli deposited a sacrifice bunt just a foot in front of home plate to move Lucas to third. Fiona Kelleher put a bunt toward third, giving Sam Boyer no choice but to make the play to first as Lucas came home to give the Lady Pirates a 2-0 lead.

Teman, a senior, didn’t allow a hit until the sixth inning when Rylee McGinley led off with a double down the third base line and then used her speed to produce the only run of the game for Northwestern. McGinley stole third and quickly got back on her feet and motored toward the plate when the throw from catcher Kelleher went down the third base line. McGinley scored ahead of the throw home to cut the Palisades lead to 2-1.

“I think she (Teman) threw a lot more changeups against us than what she normally does,” said Northwestern head coach Kate Farber. “The first time we faced her I could probably count on one hand how many times she threw that.

“ You could tell right away that was definitely a weapon that she has either been keeping a secret or refined since the last time we played them.”

Northwestern’s second hit of the game came with one out in the seventh when Ainsley Behler lined a single through the middle. Behler was bunted to second, but Teman got her ninth strikeout for the final out of the game.

The Northwestern offense that hit .371 in the regular season hit just .206 in three Colonial League playoff games and its average of 10.4 runs per game dipped to just six runs in the three playoff games. Much of that can be attributed to facing good teams and strong pitching but it is a trend that Northwestern has to reverse.

“Last year we took some lumps to get to this game, and I think that fueled our fire when we got here,” said Farber. “This year, with all due respect, we didn’t , we have pretty much teen on top since we played Nazareth, which was a long time ago.

“I don’t want to say that maybe this needed to happen, but everything happens for a reason. I have complete faith in them that this is going to send them on a trajectory upward.”

For the District 11 playoffs, league champions are automatically seeded number one. None of the Schuylkill League teams in the 4A classification were league champions and Palisades is in 3A, so Northwestern remains at the top of the ratings that determine seeding for districts, giving them the tournament’s top seed.