Northwestern might be peaking at just the right time.

The Tigers entered the Colonial League field hockey tournament with seven straight wins, outscoring their opponents 44-6 during that stretch.

That momentum continued Monday in the wild-card round, as sophomore Cara Thomas scored three goals and Northwestern rolled past Bangor 4-1 to punch its ticket to the semifinals.

“I know you wouldn’t think it, but they would tell you that one of their weaknesses is their confidence, that they’re not very confident in what they were doing,” Tigers head coach Lissa Opolsky said with a laugh. “So that was one of our focuses, as we hit a little slump in the beginning of the season with playing some really good teams, obviously, the outcomes weren’t necessarily what we wanted, but the lessons I think outweighed those outcomes a little bit. And they have been gaining their confidence, and I think you see that on the field with the speed at which they play, the intensity that they’re playing with, and obviously, the further you go in any tournament you’re going to see teams that are able to be a little bit more evenly-matched with shots and things like that. But we’re really confident in our ability to stay in those games, and play in those games.

“They become stressful and not stressful, and (seniors) Brinley (Rex) and Brooke (Page) were the ones on the field when they were freshmen and sophomores and we won last. But they’ll admit to you they were like deer in the headlights; they didn’t know what to do, where to go. So now they finally have that feeling of, ‘I am doing this,’ and I think you can see that.”

Northwestern won back-to-back district titles in 2019 and 2020, with the latter a year the program also won a league title.

The third-seeded Tigers (14-4-1) have been playing championship-caliber field hockey down the stretch.

“Throughout the entire season, the whole team has really focused on working together, getting our passes to be really good and just flow really, really well,” said Rex. “So I think just practicing that the entire time (has really helped).

“We came in with this mindset that we want to dominate, and we want to win. So what we have been working on the whole season is just dominating, not giving up, always pressuring and working together to get that pass up (the field), and I think we just work really, really well as a team and that’s why we just constantly were attacking, because we all just talk so much and we just work really well together.”

The Tigers broke through on a goal by Thomas with 6:30 to play in the second period, her ninth score of the season.

Thomas scored her second goal after Rex used her speed and vision to make it 2-0 with under 3:00 to play in the first half.

“It definitely helps take a little bit of the pressure off for sure,” Rex said of the goals. “Definitely in the first half when it was a 0-0 game, it was very important for us to score just to take a little bit of pressure off.”

Thomas scored her third goal of the game early in the third period, after another big run by Rex to give the Tigers a 3-0 lead with 13:03 to play in the third period.

Sophomore Olivia Costa’s goal with 13:49 to play in the fourth quarter made it 4-0.

Northwestern will play No. 2 seed Wilson Thursday at Northern Lehigh at 5 p.m. in the semis.

Sixth-seeded Bangor (7-11-1) got on the board with 6:21 to play in the fourth quarter when Ana Jones converted a shot in front of the cage.

Rex sliced through the middle of the defense throughout the night, generating scoring opportunities and putting the Bangor defense on its heels. Northwestern finished with a 24-3 edge in shots on goal.