First Northwestern was up, then it was down.

By halftime, it trailed Palmerton 31-24, but its play late in the first half couldn’t have given them a good feeling going into the locker room for halftime.

The Blue Bombers were driving the lane with impunity and scoring at will, while Northwestern’s game inside the paint was completely shut down and it had to fight for every basket.

The good news for the Tigers is that somewhere along the line, the script got flipped and they were able to get out of the Moravian Academy Athletic and Wellness Center with a 49-35 win. The victory not only gave Northwestern the Colonial League championship, but coach Chris Deutsch picked up his 300th win as a coach.

Northwestern opened with quick back-to-back three-pointers from Ali Lister and Sydney Nyce and first moved to a 10-3 lead before stretching it to 12-4.

The tide then shifted and Palmerton took control on both offense and defense. The result was a 10-0 run for the Bombers that had the score tied 12-12 after the first quarter. The momentum continued for Palmerton in the second and the lead grew to 28-19 with just over two-minutes left in the first half.

“It was actually a very calm halftime for us,” said Deutsch. “I didn’t feel that yelling and screaming at them was going to work, so it was just a matter of talking about what we needed to do differently and sending them back out.”

The approach worked.

Northwestern came out looking as confident as ever and went about chipping into the seven-point deficit it faced. The Tigers defense bit down on the Bombers offense and went on a 14-0 run, holding Palmerton to just two points in the quarter. They showed that it was no fluke and again held the Bombers to just two points in the final quarter while scoring the final 11 points of the game to finish things off. All four of Palmerton’s second half points were scored by junior Brianna Moore.

“We knew we had to play better defense in the second half,” said Paige Sevrain, who finished with 11 points. “We gave up 31 in the first half and we don’t like to give up that many in the entire game, so we really worked harder to close the holes that we had earlier. She [Moore] is a really good player and it’s not easy to shut her down.”

While Palmerton tried to focus on Sevrain and Lister, they forgot about senior Sydney Nyce, who scored a team-high 13 points for Northwestern, well over her 4.7 points per game average.

“I had some open looks and was able to take advantage of them,” said Nyce. “They weren’t focusing on me as much as they were a couple of other players and the other girls were able to get the ball to me.”

Meanwhile, Lister, who suffered a cut lip early in the game but was able to return, finished with 11 points. Lister admitted that one of the team’s goals was a Colonial League championship, but the goals don’t stop there.

“I think winning this game and getting these gold medals gives us even more of an incentive and confidence going into districts,” said Lister. “It feels good to have these medals and we’ve said that we wanted to win districts, too. We feel like we’ve got a good chance but we know it’s not going to be easy. We can savor this win tonight, but we’ll probably be right back at practice tomorrow and be ready for districts.”

As for Palmerton, its defense was strong early in the game but struggled after halftime. Coach Dan Beck was happy with the effort that his team gave throughout the contest and credited Northwestern with an impressive showing.

“Let’s face it, Northwestern played a really good game,” said Beck. “We knew when we had them down that they weren’t going to just give up and let us win and they certainly didn’t. We can just regroup and get ready for districts.”

DIFFERENT TEAMS … When you compare the two teams, there are a lot of differences. Northwestern will lose four of their starters to graduation after the season, while the entire starting lineup for the Bombers will be back next season. The Tigers will also lose three players who impact the team coming off the bench.

NO BIG DEAL … Deutsch was his usual humble self when asked about collecting his 300th win. “It’s really the fact that I’ve had a lot of really good players over the years and I’ve been here a long time. That’s really what I owe it to is having such good kids that want to be coached and have a lot of talent. I also have to credit my family because they put up with all of my time away.” Because the team had to exit quickly for the boys championship game, they planned a celebration for later complete with balloons and a poster for the coach.

PALMERTON

Frantz 2-1-1-6, Matsko 1-2-5-4, Balliet 0-0-0-0, Nemeth 0-0-0-0, Morgan 2-3-6-7, Moore 8-1-2-18. TOTALS: 13-7-14-35.

NORTHWESTERN

Betz 0-0-0-0, Lister 5-0-0-11, Miller 2-0-0-4, Jones 2-2-2-8, Ledeboer 0-2-2-2, Funk 0-0-0-0, Nyce 5-1-2-13, Sevrain 4-3-4-11. TOTALS: 18-8-10-49.

Palmerton 12 19 2 2 - 35

Northwestern 12 12 14 11 - 49

Three-pointers: Palmerton - Frantz 1, Moore 1; Northwestern - Jones 2, Nyce 2, Lister 1.