St Pat's down Lithgow Panthers 3-2 in the men's Premier League Hockey major semi-final

With just four teams in the men's competition this season, a major-semi final between the Saints and Panthers was sealed well before Saturday's qualifier in Lithgow.

While three-time defending premiers Panthers finished the regular season on top of the ladder, the record between the Lithgow outfit and the Saints stood even at one win, one loss and a draw apiece.

It pointed to a hard-fought preliminary final and that's exactly what unfolded.

Neither side managed to find the mark in the first two quarters of the match and it took Panthers being reduced to 10 players - a yellow card being produced for a dangerous tackle - to give the Saints a chance to bag the opener.

It was captain Shane Conroy who found the mark, but Panthers were soon back on level terms thanks to Tom Piggott.

With five minutes to go Panthers vice captain Trent MacDonald gave his side the lead, but hungry to make their first grand final since 2015, the Saints rallied.

Conroy nabbed his second for the day to lock it up at 2-all and with not much time left on the clock, it looked as if the match was headed into extra-time.

But Willott came up with the match winner and the Saints held out Panthers for the last 30 seconds to book their spot in the August 31 decider in Orange.

"We've made the semi [and now] we're through to the grand final, we knew it was going to be a tight match, anyone could have won that game," St Pat's coach Niel Howard said.

"We changed a few things up at half-time and I think our fitness helped us at the end.

"I thought we controlled the ball well most of the game, our younger guys up front in particular."

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While Howard's men will now have a week off from playing - Panthers will take on Wanderers in the preliminary final - the coach plans to keep pushing his men at training.

"We've now got the week off from playing but Panthers don't ... so I think it's a bad thing we have that week off because we always play terrible after a week off, but hopefully all will be good," he said.

Howard said standout players for Pat's were Fletcher Norris and Blake Davis.

Panthers' MacDonald said the last minute of the match was unlucky and a painful experience.

"Pat's got in the circle so that hurt, I guess it doesn't matter too much because we've got next week to give it another shot," he said.

MacDonald admitted his team didn't step up as much as they should've and there was room for improvement.

"We were lacking in the centre of the field and they [St Pat's] hurt us there," he said.

"Pat's have some good players so they went quite well through the centre, which we knew they would, we tried to nullify that but it didn't happen because we didn't mark up, so it's our fault," he said.

MacDonald said Panthers' stand out players were goalkeeper Logan Hunter and Shaun McSorley.

In Saturday's minor semi-final, underdogs Orange Wanderers upset Parkes.

While Wanderers had not managed a win prior to the finals, they got the better of Parkes in another thrilling battle.

It took until the final quarter, with nine minutes left on the clock, for Wanderers to open scoring via Keegan Brooke.

That looked as if it would be enough, but Parkes levelled from a penalty corner play with 44 seconds left on the clock to force extra-time.

It was Wanderers who came up with the match winner to put them in the a preliminary final.