ROCHESTER HILLS >> Somewhat nondescript through the first half, Troy Athens and Utica Eisenhower eventually produced a spellbinding 100 minutes of scoreless action Tuesday night.

The Red Hawks played almost 45 of those minutes with 10 players, kept it level, then defeated Ike 4-2 in penalty kicks at Rochester High School to advance to Friday’s D1 regional final.

When the time arrived for the match to be decided by spot kicks, whatever advantage the Eagles had dissipated. Athens was just a handful of days removed from beating rival Troy in a shootout for its district championship.

It showed from the start of Tuesday’s penalties, which began with Red Hawks senior goalkeeper Ashley Miller, who both stopped a shot and scored the winning kick in the shootout against the Colts, diving to her left to deny the Eagles in the first round.

While both Lily Pantaleo and Gabby Riggio made their penalties, Ike had another penalty misfire off the football crossbar. Athens’ first three takers, Lauren DeJonckheere, Emily Mendrick, and Annie Lawson, all converted, then Charlotte Cotta smashed hers top bins to ensue a well-earned celebration.

“I think something really important for us to remember was we were talking at practice about, yeah, (Eisenhower) have a lot of D1 commits, and they have a lot of good players, but something that stuck out to me was, for every good player they had, we had a good player in the same position, if not just as good or better,” said Lawson, a junior defender who was pivotal to surviving the extended time her team played at a man disadvantage. “I kept that in my thoughts as I played that we shouldn’t be scared just because they’re (college) committed. That should make us want to beat them even more.”

“We were completely confident,” Red Hawks head coach Jason Clark added. “Ashley Miller has been outstanding. I mean, PKs are her thing; it’s this year, last year. We went to PKs last year against Berkley and it grew this team … Ashley’s come such a long way and we couldn’t do it without her.”

Both teams had moments in the first 40 minutes before the game, which veered into unpredictable territory with 24 minutes remaining in the second half. A long, direct ball played by Eisenhower required a sliding tackle by junior defender Abby Waldron that had her shown a red card, but denied the Eagles an A-grade scoring opportunity just at the edge of the box, and the resulting free kick deflected off a wall of Athens defenders.

Of the sending off, Clark said, “That card, (Abby) saved the game for us.”

The Red Hawks fought for their lives to keep it even in the 10 minutes that followed the dismissal. Lawson cleared a ball off the line after Ellera Jakubowski had beaten a defender and got past Athens goalkeeper Ashley Miller, then Miller was called into action twice, including a second stop that produced a reactive push to deny a hard shot from not too far out.

DeJonckheere slotted a through ball behind to Lily Greaves that forced Eisenhower goalkeeper Molly Mellott to come far off her line for a potentially game-saving denial with five minutes left in regulation, which nearly ended in spectacularly dramatic fashion.

Overtime looked all but guaranteed, but Eisenhower (18-3) hooved a ball over the top with 10 seconds left that required Miller to rush out of the box and break it up.

The rebound fell to Pantaleo, who ripped an effort from roughly 40 yards out that went over everyone’s heads but crossed the goal line seemingly fractions of a second after the whistle had blown.

Asked what she was feeling at that point, Lawson responded, “I was just like ‘let’s just hold on.’ I just wanted us to push. I don’t think I’ve felt more emotions (than) in that game. I just wanted us to get the ball up, like, let’s just stay alive. I felt like we just had to be scrappy and we were in survival mode.”

Pantaleo had the only quality opportunity of the first overtime with a shot from beyond the 18-yard box that had the right power but was off-frame.

Athens (17-2-2) won a free kick attached to an Ike yellow card in the first 30 seconds of the second overtime, though it was directed out for an Eagles’ goal kick. Several minutes later, Gabby Gojcaj had a look from an off-balance shot with a defender on her back, which appeared to be enough to prevent her from getting it on target.

Cotta let it rip with a shot that Mellott was able to corral with relative easy with four minutes remaining in that second overtime, then Gojcaj had another turn about a minute after that when a 50-50 challenge fell her way, but that didn’t amount to anything either, and the teams went to spot kicks.

“I have to say we were the better team,” Eagles head coach Mehrdad Nekoogar said regarding his team’s quality before the game went to a shootout. “If you count the number of chances, we had so many, and if you don’t finish in soccer, you’re not gonna win.

“We already knew it went to PKs it was going to be tough because they do have a very good goalie. We put everything out there.

“We threw everything out there but we couldn’t put the ball in the net.

“Things didn’t go the way we wanted, but congratulations to Athens.”

Despite their successes, the last time the two programs had met previously was in 2015 when the Red Hawks beat Ike 2-0 for a regional championship. They also faced off earlier that season with the Eagles getting a 2-1 victory in Troy.

Standing between the Red Hawks and a regional title on Friday will be Dakota, who defeated Berkley 2-0 in the first semifinal of the night.