Lady Tigers’ coach Chris Deutsch and Lehighton girls coach Joe Berezwick are close friends off the court, but Saturday they were battling each other tooth and nail as the coaches of two quarterfinal teams in the girls 4A district playoffs.

Lehighton got big performances from several players with sophomore Charli McHugh scoring 18 points, just one shy of her career high, while senior Aaliyah Fisher provided tough defense and the role players for the Indians all made key plays in a 37-34 win for Lehighton.

Northwestern (21-5) opened the game with a couple early foul shots by Cara Thomas to take a 2-0 lead, but the Tigers would trail through the rest of the game until the final minute when Thomas stripped the ball away and fed it to senior Rachel Dorney coming through the paint to give the Lady Tigers a 34-32 lead.

The run was initiated by Thomas and junior Maci Fisher hitting on back-to-back possessions to tie the game before McHugh broke the tie with a drive to the basket at the other end of the court.

Paige Sevrain had an answer to that and moved down low to again tie the game and set up the Thomas to Dorney heroics. In the second half, Northwestern tied the score five separate times, but on the four other occasions Lehighton (12-11) regained the lead.

“You have to hand it to Lehighton because they were able to find ways to keep their heads above water when we put pressure on them,” said Deutsch. “They always had someone step up with a basket or a big defensive play and kept us from getting any real momentum through most of the game.”

On the other end of the court, McHugh again went to work to execute her team’s game plan when she drew Sevrain out to the wing to defend her.

Just as Sevrain stepped toward the sophomore forward, McHugh advanced and was fouled on her way to dropping in a layup that tied the game. She then converted her foul shot and would finish out the scoring with two more foul shots to put the game in the win column for the Indians.

“To be honest, I was a little concerned because we did not have a good week of practice,” said Deutsch. “We were listless all week and didn’t have a lot of intensity in our practices and scrimmages and I was concerned about that.

“I was hoping we would put everything together today and snap out of it, but we never got in sync, and we played below how we are capable of playing.”

While Northwestern Lehigh struggled to find a groove, they were able to stick close and never trailed by more than seven points in the game. At halftime, Lehighton held a 16-15 lead and held a 28-24 lead after the third quarter.

McHugh’s 18 points were a game-high, while junior Paige Sevrain finished with 14 for Northwestern Lehigh and Thomas finished with eight.