New Life Academy vows to energize its students. Its baseball team is living off that motto.

Junior right-hander Sam Horner threw a two-hitter and senior John Horner scored the winning run in the eighth inning as the Eagles upset Class 1A defending state champion BOLD 3-2 in the semifinals Friday afternoon at Chaska Athletic Park. They will play the winner of Chatfield and New York Mills in the finals Monday at Target Field starting at noon.

“We’ve been waiting since eighth grade to play at Target Field,” said John, who had two of the Eagles’ seven hits. “This is great.”

John opened the top of the eighth inning with a single, advanced to second and third on walks and scored on Ben Brown’s fielder’s choice with one out.

His younger brother then set down BOLD (22-4) in order in the bottom half of the inning, just like he had done in the seventh. He struck out four and walked one. Both of the Warriors runs were unearned.

“That’s the best I’ve seen him throw,” John said. “He was excellent.”

BOLD (Bird Island, Olivia Lake Lillian school district) tied it with two runs in the sixth inning, benefiting from two catcher’s interference calls on consecutive pitches. The Warriors’ Riley Kramer apparently grounded out to third base to end the frame, but catcher’s interference was called on the play. On the next pitch, Logan Sandgren was awarded first base on catcher’s interference to load the bases. Ben Steffel’s grounder then went through the legs of the second baseman, plating two runs.

“We faced some adversity with a couple of calls, but we battled through it,” John said.

Woodbury-based New Life Academy (24-4) took a quick 1-0 lead in the first inning. Sam reached an error, advanced to third on a double by John and scored on sophomore Simon Killeen’s groundout to shortstop.

“That run in the first was huge,” John said. “It showed us right away that we could play with them.”

The Eagles added their second run in the sixth inning, thanks to another BOLD error. Killeen, who opened the frame with a single, scored on a throwing error on the third baseman. He had moved up to third on a sacrifice bunt and single by senior Alex Busch.

“I knew we were the underdog,” Sam said. “They were the best team in the state. I just threw strikes, and hoped for the best.”

Note: The Minnesota State High School League announced Friday afternoon that championship games originally scheduled for Saturday at Target Field would take place instead on Monday.