SOUTH HADLEY — A penalty shootout won Frontier Regional the Western Massachusetts Division 3 boys soccer title last season.
On Thursday, another one gave the Red Hawks a chance to defend it.
No. 4 Frontier outlasted top-seeded Hampshire Regional 8-7 in the semifinal shootout after a 1-1 tie at the end of regulation and two overtime periods.
The Red Hawks (12-3-4) will face No. 3 Belchertown (12-7-1) Sunday at Westfield State in a matchup of the past two sectional champions.
“We love the challenges. We’re very happy to be playing Belchertown,” Frontier coach Dale Totman said.
Hampshire and Frontier each made their initial penalty, but Frontier sophomore keeper Peter Bronke saved Hampshire’s second attempt by Regan Bishop. Frontier’s Ben Arnold missed his shot to keep the shootout level.
“It was really intense. It was really nerve-wracking,” Bronke said.
Each team hit six consecutive penalties following the miss, then Bronke and Hampshire keeper Mike McColgan each made a save in Round 9.
“Nobody wants to go to penalties, sometimes it does,” McColgan said. “That save got me hyped up, but you can’t save them all.”
Matt Babyak hit Hampshire’s eighth penalty kick too high and off the crossbar. That set up Tenzin Tsundue to win the game. He beat McColgan to the bottom-left corner of the goal, turned around and ran toward a mob of red swarming him.
“Every time you miss one you get further and further into thinking you’re going to miss,” Bronke said. “With everyone cheering me on it was nice.”
It didn’t take long for the Red Hawks’ student section to join them on the field in celebration and to sing the fight song.
Out of the 10 rounds, Frontier missed one penalty outright, while Alex Gheorghita’s was saved.
Noah Jacques made one of the Red Hawks’ penalties, earning a measure of redemption for an earlier mistake. He attempted to clear a Dillon Pooler cross in the 26th minute but sent it into his own net.
Frontier coach Dale Totman reminded his team of the adversity it faced during the season at halftime.
“I said hey let’s look at this like a microcosm of the season,” he said. “We’re down, but there’s still so much to play for. Can we pull out of this? Can we pass this mental strength test?”
Doug Hanieski did.
He corralled a ball inside Hampshire’s penalty box in the 43rd minute and fired it past McColgan to tie the game at 1.
“It came out to me, I took a touch, it bounced a bit because of the turf, I just tired to hit it with the outside of my foot, it curled to corner,” Hanieski said.
Frontier created the better chances over the remaining 37 minutes of regulation and both overtime periods but couldn’t find a winner.
“We really put the hurt on them at the end, we just couldn’t finish,” Bronke said.
Bronke and the Red Hawks shooters finished it in short order.
Hampshire lost in a penalty shootout for the second consecutive season. It was the final game for Raiders seniors Babyak, Bishop, Brody Dean, Graham George, Harry George, Dan McColgan Anthony Nardi, Pooler, Oguzhan Ibic and Alex Rizos.
Kyle Grabowski can be reached at kgrabowski@gazettenet.com.