Seeded second, the Crusaders (19-3-1) then sat back and let the defense handle the Lancers the rest of the night. Led by defenders Jenni Hamlin and Tess Huettner, the Lancers (6-10-1) were held in check for much of the night.
"We came out early and got a couple of quick goals, but then it seemed like we sat back and didn't play well offensively. This time of year, you can't do that and expect to keep advancing," Althoff coach Juergen Huettner said. "But I thought our defense just really picked it up. They were the ones who really came through tonight."
The win pushed Althoff into the regional title game on Friday against fifth-seed O'Fallon at 6 p.m. at Triad.
The Panthers defeated Triad 1-0 in the other semifinal.
Pawloski took a pass from Allison Bevenue and beat Lancers goalie Lauren Mays from 15 yards out to give Althoff a 1-0 lead with 28 minutes left in the first half.
"That was just a perfect goal. There's nothing you can do when a team executed like that," Lancers coach Mark Lasley said. "When they (Althoff) got the second goal on the PK, I knew we had our work cut out for us, because it's tough for us to play from behind sometimes.
"I thought we played much better in the second half, but for some reason, in some games we've been a slow-starting team this year. The girls played hard, though. It was a good effort."
O'Fallon 1, Triad 0
Senior Melissa Roewe scored after a wild scramble in front of the Triad goal with five minutes left as the fifth-seeded Panthers ended the season of the Mississippi Valley Conference champion Knights with a shutout.
With play on the Knights' end of the field, the ball came loose to the right of the goal and Roewe was able to sneak a hard, low shot into the bottom right-hand corner of the net for the only goal of the match.
"The way I saw it was that there was a scramble in front of the goal, and the ball came out. Melissa was right there and got the shot past the goalie," O'Fallon coach David Ames said. "It's good that we finally got a good break tonight. We've been kind of unlucky this year."
O'Fallon advances with an 8-8-2 record while Triad ends its season 14-9.
Contact reporter Dean Criddle at 239-2665 or dcriddle@bnd.com.
