Seniors are the backbone of any varsity team.

Northwestern field hockey seniors had a chance to win their fourth straight district title last week when they traveled to Palmerton’s Bomber Stadium for the District 11 Class A final.

The group got number four with a 6-1 win over Wilson.

“The senior class comes with a lot of different personalities and a lot of different skill sets,” said Tiger head coach Lissa Opolsky. “I think each bring something to the table, whether it’s leadership or field hockey skills. You really saw that on display today and they all got to finish the game together. We had all of the senior players on the field.”

Senior Taylor Langley had three goals, two off corner plays.

Three of the six goals that the Tigers scored were the result of penalty corners. The one constant on all of those corners is that junior Faith Slifer is the one inserting the ball to start the play.

“It just all starts off with Faith and her getting the push out,” said Langley. “She’s had probably one of the most important roles and she doesn’t get enough credit for it all. No one gets to see the work that she puts in, and like I said, it all starts with her.”

Northwestern’s first goal came when Slifer inserted the ball to Hannah Gober, who got a strong shot off that worked its way past goalie Abrielle Dayton for Gober’s 23rd goal of the season.

Northwestern added a goal in the second quarter. This time, it was Langley who scored her 23rd of the year to give the Tigers a 2-0 lead.

Wilson put on its toughest attack of the game when the third quarter got underway. A couple of shots went wide or were kicked away by goalie Ryan Smolinsky.

It took four minutes of trying, but eventually Carli Apgar was able to cut the lead to 2-1.

The Tigers’ defense stiffened to be sure that Wilson wouldn’t be able to tie the game. Meanwhile, the offense kept working to rebuild the lead to two goals.

It took the rest of the quarter for Northwestern to get that goal, but with one second remaining before halftime, Haley Kerschner poked the ball through a group of players in front of the goal and Langley found it and put it in the net for a 3-1 advantage.

“Our team has been working hard since the summer,” said Kerschner. “We’ve put in the effort and we’ve had the goal of winning districts again.

“We gave up that one goal and that was unfortunate, but we bounced right back and kept them from getting too many other opportunities.”

Knowing they were 15 minutes away from gold medals, Northwestern dug in its heels defensively. With Wilson having to focus more on offense to try to catch the Tigers, the defensive play of the Warriors got a little shaky.

Langley got her third goal of the game on a corner play and Gober scored her second goal when she fired a shot from about 18 yards away from the goal. Dayton barely had a chance to move on the shot, and it went to the back of the goal.

McKensey Miller closed out the scoring when she tipped in a ball that came toward her at the front of the goal.

“We were all just working together and trying to get some goals into the back of the net, and have some fun while we were out there,” said Miller, who is also a senior. “I think that the whole team, but especially the seniors really kicked it in after they got their goal.

“We were determined not to let this one slip away, so it was important to shut them down and then look to keep scoring.”