MECHANICSBURG — Even with a 2-0 lead at halftime, Northwestern boys soccer coach Nate Hunsicker and his players weren’t happy with their first half performance in the PIAA 2A championship Saturday at Eagle View Middle School.

The team’s intensity picked up in the second half, and the Tigers went on to defeat Cathedral Prep 4-0 to win the program’s second state championship in three seasons. This time around, Northwestern not only grabbed the state championship, but they also finished with a perfect 28-0-0 record.

With the exception of the District 11 semifinal game against Moravian Academy where Northwestern was shutout through the first 40 minutes, the Tigers went longer in this game without scoring than in any of their other postseason games.

It wasn’t until 33:06 into the first half that the Tigers broke the ice to get on the board when Cole Mertz sent a ball toward the goal and drew goalie A.J. Sirianni out of the net. Mertz’s kick went off Cathedral Prep’s Carter Budacki, and Jake van Lierop was able to gain control of the ball as Sirianni and Budacki collided. Van Lierop stepped around the pair and fired into an empty net to give Northwestern a 1-0 lead.

While the offense may not have been playing its tight style of play, the Tigers were able to capitalize on mistakes by the Ramblers (18-7-0). In an effort to stop van Lierop from getting another goal, a defender pulled him down in the box and van Lierop was awarded a penalty kick. The program’s all-time leading goal scorer waited for the ref’s whistle and danced to his left before approaching the ball, added a bit of a stutter step on his approach and fired to the right of Sirianni. The goalie had likely been watching video of Van Lierop, who generally puts his penalty kicks to the right side of the goal and moved to his left on the kick and was unable to adjust to come back toward the ball.

“We didn’t play particularly well in that first half,” said Hunsicker. “We did a better job in the second half, but I have seen us play better all-around games. They could have had a couple of goals in that first half, but Brandon (Krapf) made some good plays in goal, and we were able to turn them away.”

Northwestern cashed in on another opportunity for its third goal with 13:24 left in regulation. Cathedral Prep was awarded a goal kick and defender Declan Toohey took the kick, but instead of being able to clear the ball out of the zone, he kept the ball on the ground and van Lierop controlled the ball, moved around Toohey and as Sirianni came out of the goal, moved around him and pushed the ball into the back of the net to provide more breathing room for Northwestern.

The hat trick was the 19th of the season for van Lierop and gave him 74 goals on the season, the most ever by a Northwestern player, to go with 25 assists.

“It’s going to be tough to move on from this, but you always want to move on in life,” said van Lierop about his high school career coming to an end. “I’m going to look back in a couple of years and think about how much fun it was.”

While van Lierop’s time with his teammates is done, sophomore Cole Mertz has two more seasons of high school soccer. Mertz finished the season with 23 goals, and added the final tally of the day for the Tigers.

“I just dribbled toward the goal, and we were already up by three, so I thought I might as well take a crack at it and try to finish it and make it even better,” said Mertz. “We picked up momentum as the game went on and I think we were playing more like ourselves later in the game after a slow start.”

For goalie Brandon Krapf, the championship had more of a family feeling to it. His brother, Damien was the goalie on the 2022 state championship team and the pair were able to celebrate a second championship as a starting goalie for the family.

“He (Damien) is actually here tonight, and he brought his medal, so we were able to get a picture together with our medals; it’s pretty special,” said the younger Krapf. “If you count all of the championship games (league, districts, and states), we could have won 12 championships during my career and we won nine. We missed two years ago on the Colonial League championship and missed twice in states, so that’s a pretty good run.”

BY THE NUMBERS… This was the first perfect season in the program’s history, and the Tigers outscored their opponents by a score of 162-15 in their 28 games. Krapf and the team had 17 shutouts this season, including winning all three championships with shutouts. The team loses 10 seniors who combined for 97 goals and 72 assists and will also lose Krapf, their starting goalie. The returning underclassmen put up impressive numbers this season as well with 60 goals and 59 assists.

FAN SUPPORT… The team received a big sendoff from fans when they left Northwestern Lehigh High School, and returned to a huge reception from fans that included an escort down Routes 100 and 309 from various fire companies and the Pennsylvania State Police. “The sendoff was great,” said Hunsicker. “The first 30 minutes of the bus ride was a little wild, but the last hour was pretty quiet. I think the guys all settled in and got themselves focused on what they had to do to win and just what the game meant.”

ALUMNI SUPPORT… In addition to Damien Krapf being on hand for the game, a number of players from previous seasons supported the team by making the trip to Mechanicsburg. The Northwestern Lehigh cheering section took up most of the stands at Eagle View Middle School.