Saucon Valley guards the Salisbury goal at Palisades Tuesday night.
The Palisades stands were filled with Saucon Valley Panther fans wearing red and black and Salisbury Falcon fans wearing blue and white Tuesday night.
The boys game started a half hour later than scheduled due to the Sacuon and Salisbury Girls’ Semifinals game going into double overtime and then penalty kicks. The Salisbury girls won the hard-fought game against the Panthers in penalty kicks.
A tie was the result the last time these two boys’ teams played each other, earlier in the month. Being a playoff game, a tie was not an option for second seed Salisbury and third seed Saucon.
Feeling at ease on their familiar turf surface, Salisbury was quick to the ball and strung their passes together to get the ball down the field to Saucon’s goal. Senior Goalkeeper Noah Kriner made several saves, but one got by him late in the first half resulting in Salisbury’s first goal. With 16 seconds left in the first half, Kriner deflected a Salisbury shot, but they were quick to respond and got it past Saucon’s defense for their second goal.
Saucon modified their lineup with a slight personnel change in the beginning of the second half.
Salisbury’s third and final goal occurred with 15 minutes left in the second half. Saucon’s defense regrouped and stepped up their defensive play to keep Salisbury from getting on the scoreboard again.
The Saucon Valley boys soccer team ends their Colonial League season 8-3-2. But this is not the last game for Saucon this year. District games start soon.
Number one seed Northwestern defeated the fourth seed Palisades Tuesday night.
Northwestern and Salisbury will play in the Colonial League finals on Thursday at Northern Lehigh.
