The Northwestern Lehigh baseball team came through a stretch of five games in seven days in good shape, winning the last four games including taking two from Lehighton and another from rival Northern Lehigh.

The wins made the Tigers the Colonial League West Division champions and put them in the driver’s seat to clinch the top seed in the league playoffs. They are also trying to chase down Tamaqua for the top spot in the District 11 4A classification but will be no worse than the number two seed in districts.

In the first game against the Indians, pitchers ruled the game for seven innings until Northwestern put up six runs in the top of the eighth to take a 9-3 win. Cole Dynda threw six innings, and Watson Church threw two perfect innings in the win for the Tigers as they combined for 11 strikeouts.

Eli Zimmerman opened the eighth with a walk and stole second base before a wild pitch moved him to third. Cannon Fitch walked and Dynda doubled to left field to drive in both runners for a 5-3 advantage.

Two outs later, Aidan Freeman singled to right and went to second on the play when the ball was misplayed. Dynda scored from second on the play to make it 6-3.

Nolan Fitzgerald was hit by a pitch and Shane Hulmes doubled to left for his second hit of the day, driving in two more runs. A hit batter and a walk loaded the bases, and Fitch recorded his second walk of the inning to force across the sixth run of the inning for a 9-3 lead.

In the second meeting, the pitching dual lasted the entire game as Northwestern won 2-1.

Freeman threw a complete game and allowed just three hits and one walk while striking out 10 batters. The only run he allowed was unearned.

Lehighton went up 1-0 in the top of the first and held on to the slim advantage until Northwestern put up two runs in the fourth.

Fitzgerald led off the fourth with a bunt single and advanced to second when a pickoff throw to first was wild. Max George was looking to advance Fitzgerald to third with a bunt and not only did that but reached base on a single.

Hulmes drew a walk to load the bases and Brady Zimmerman singled through the middle to plate two runs for the first Tigers lead of the game at 2-1.

From there, Freeman retired nine of the final 10 batters, four of them by strikeouts, to preserve the win.

The two other wins in the four-game streak were full on slugfests.

In a 14-13 win over Jim Thorpe, Church hit his first home run of the season to plate three runs for Northwestern and he drove in a fourth run on a single.

The Tigers put up five runs in the bottom of the sixth and needed all of them as the Olympians struck for two in the top of the seventh before Dynda came on to get the final two outs.

The win over Northern Lehigh was a 12-10 affair. This time, it was Dynda launching a three-run home run, his second of the season. Fitzgerald had a two-run single and both Josh Farber and Freeman had two hits in the win.

Griffin Unrath threw four scoreless innings of relief to get the win for Northwestern.

The Tigers (14-2 Colonial, 16-2 overall) have a rematch with Jim Thorpe (6-9, 7-10) on the road and then finish their regular season schedule at home against Palmerton (10-6, 10-6).