Northwestern Lehigh put up a strong fight in the Colonial League playoffs before falling to Palmerton in the quarterfinals. Now, with an extended layoff of two weeks, the Tigers must shake off any rust that may have accumulated and look to fight their way through the District 11 playoffs. The battle starts Friday night when they travel to Catasauqua High School as the number six seed in the 4A classification to face No. 3 Bethlehem Catholic in a quarterfinal matchup.

Thanks to an early exit in the East Penn Conference playoffs, the Golden Hawks (16-6) have also had a long layoff, so they too will need to get back into the swing of things in districts. Bethlehem Catholic lost to Nazareth in the EPC quarterfinals.

The Tigers (12-11) are a young team with just three seniors in Josh Heilman, Ethan Lazarus, and Dylan Witkowski. The three have combined for an average of 23 points per game on the season for Northwestern Lehigh. The offense has been strong for the Tigers during the season after getting through some inconsistency in the middle part of the season. The same can be said for their defense, which has looked strong at times only to get torched their next time out. Such inconsistencies are common with a younger team.

Juniors Cade Christopher and Cayden Fitch have put together good seasons and freshman Gavin Nelson has come on later in the season to provide extra punch to the Northwestern Lehigh lineup.

Senior Edixon Gomez leads Bethlehem Catholic in scoring with 21 points per game this season. He has missed considerable time with a knee injury, but the time off has helped to put him as close to being 100 percent physically as he could possibly be. Ryan Glassmacher is an all-around player for the Hawks, who averages 14 points per game, but is just as comfortable passing off to someone with a better shot. On the season, Glassmacher has tallied 52 assists and defensively has produced 34 blocks and 36 steals for Bethlehem Catholic.

The defensive leader for Beca is Steve Recchio, also a senior, will likely be matching up against Witkowski, looking to keep the Tigers offensive leader from putting up too many points in the game.

Bethlehem Catholic made it to the district finals last season before being ousted by Allentown Central Catholic. Northwestern Lehigh fell to the Vikings in the semifinals of last year’s tournament.