MIDDLETON, Wis. — River Falls followed its game plan almost to perfection.

It wasn’t enough.

The Wildcats withstood an early barrage and went into the final period even, but Fond du Lac Springs punched home the eventual game-winner with just under seven minutes remaining for a 2-1 victory in the Division 2 semifinals of the Wisconsin boys hockey state tournament Thursday afternoon.

“I thought we played a great game today,” River Falls coach Cam Wilken said. “We did everything, executed our game plan. We kept it tight. We wanted to see if we could kind of wear them down in the third period, and we did. They had pot luck tonight.”

Second-seeded Springs (19-9) advanced to Saturday morning’s title game against defending champion New Richmond (17-9-2), an 8-4 winner over Tomahawk in the first semifinal.

Third-seeded River Falls (14-14) was making its first trip to state since its only other appearance in 1997.

After a scoreless first period, each team tallied a power-play goal in the second stanza, taking a 1-1 tie into the third period.

With River Falls junior goalie Luke Linehan registering 34 saves through two periods, and overtime looking more like a possibility, Armani Fisher kept the puck to himself on a 3-on-2 break and punched it past Linehan from the high slot to put the Ledgers up 2-1 just past the 10-minute mark.

“I just saw the defenseman in front of me, and I saw the goalie was kind of cheating to the left side a little bit, so I shot through a screen to the upper right side,” Fisher said.

In the tightly contested defensive struggle, that turned out to be enough.

Linehan finished with 38 saves, while Brendan Gaertig had 27 stops for Springs, which got hot after starting the season 3-7.

“At the end of the day, it’s not really how any one of us plays, it’s how all of us play,” said Linehan, who turned away numerous tough shots and breakaways. “I think we played a really good game.”

After 27 first-period saves by Linehan, the Ledgers finally broke through on a power-play goal by Fisher at 4:39 of the second period.

Andrew Amundson brought the Wildcats even at 8:57 of the second period with a power-play goal from the right circle after a faceoff.

The Ledgers were assessed a five-minute major penalty for boarding at the 9:41 mark, but River Falls failed to capitalize, managing just four shots with the advantage.

River Falls salvaged a scoreless tie after one period despite being outshot 21-7. The Wildcats killed a five-minute penalty with Linehan registering eight saves during the onslaught.

“We felt good, because we had him (Linehan) in the net,” Wilken said. “We knew that was part of their game, and we talked about how the first period was probably going to be more in Springs’ favor. They wanted to push the envelope right away. We’re not built for a team to be in an 8-6 track meet.

“We were doing everything that we could that we planned for and practiced for to play in this game,” he said. “We just didn’t get the bounce we needed to. There’s not a whole heck of a lot I would have said or done differently. We just didn’t get to be on the right side of the scoreboard.”