Sewickley Academy and Seton-LaSalle have developed quite a rivalry in boys' soccer in recent years.

The Panthers and Rebels have been neck-and-neck when it comes to dominance in WPIAL Class A.

For the second time in three years, Sewickley Academy edged Seton-LaSalle in the WPIAL title game.

Senior midfielder Matt Hoch's goal with 2:20 left in the first 15-minute overtime period, provided the Panthers with a 2-1 win against Seton-LaSalle, handing the defending champions their first loss of the season. Junior Bobby O'Donnell helped set up Hoch's winning goal.

"Bobby made the play by crossing it to me and I was just in the right place," Hoch said.

Jason Limbach's goal with 18:49 left in the second half gave Sewickley Academy (22-1-2) a 1-0 lead.

Seton-LaSalle junior defender David Del Greco tied the game with a blast from 12 yards out with 5:30 left in regulation.

"We knew [Seton-LaSalle] would be coming at us hard and they kind of took possession of the game right before [scoring their only goal]," Hoch said. "They're an attacking team and we just tried to get ourselves fired up to try and stop them.

"Hopefully, we'll see them again at states and it will probably be another great game."

The Rebels (18-1-3) and Panthers were Section 3 co-champions with identical 8-0-2 records after playing to 1-1 draws twice in the regular season.

The Panthers defeated Rockwood, 4-0, Tuesday night in the first round of the PIAA playoffs and advance to the quarterfinals Saturday.

"I thought we played really well in overtime and we deserved that goal we got," Sewickley Academy coach Uwe Stender said. "We knew we were still qualified for states win or lose, so I felt like so what if we lose this one. Let's just go out there and play to win, rather than playing tentative and risk what could happen in a shootout. You've got to take risks to win and we took risks which paid off."

In the two regular-season games, Seton-LaSalle jumped ahead, 1-0, but it was Sewickley Academy that scored the first goal in the title game.

"Every time we've played them for the past few years, we seem to be down 1-0 to them, but this time we took the lead and I think it changed the psychology of the game," Stender said. "We were playing a little tentative until we got that first goal."

Stender said he expected another tight game against a talented and familiar opponent. He admitted that his players took extra time in practice working on penalty kicks just in case the game would have had to be decided by a shootout.

"This [overtime] was not that surprising," Stender said. "We practiced penalty shots a lot this week. Once they tied it 1-1, I thought we'd go into a shootout."

Stender said a 5-3 non-section loss to Class AAA finalist Bethel Park early in the season was a defining moment for his team.

"That was the one game that was the signifying game for us," Stender said. "We were down 4-0 at the half at Bethel Park and I was not happy about it because I used to coach at Bethel and I felt this was not very good.

"But we came back and we made a competitive game of it and had a couple chances to pull to within 5-4. The Bethel Park coach [Mike Galietta], whom I respect greatly, said after the game that my team never quit."

The only damper on the Sewickley Academy victory was senior forward Ian Frey sustaining a broken right leg after colliding with Seton-LaSalle goalie A.J. Smigielski with 25 minutes left in the second half. Frey was taken off the field on a motorized cart and taken to a local hospital.

"It's really upsetting to me because I really wanted him to be here [during the gold medal ceremony] because he's such a great player," Stender said. "But we now have even more of a reason to get to Hershey [for the PIAA finals].

"Hopefully, he won't be in the hospital for an extended period of time, so we can take him to Hershey with us."

Sewickley Academy won the PIAA Class AA title in 1998 and has played in the title game on two occasions since winning their only PIAA championship in boys' soccer.