ALBUQUERQUE — Scoring a goal can be a transcendental experience — just ask Los Alamos High School sophomore forward Cooper Christensen.

Christensen's moment came Thursday morning on a match-winning goal in the Hilltoppers' 2-1 quarterfinal victory against No. 4 Albuquerque Academy in the Class AAAA State Boys Soccer Tournament at the Albuquerque Public Schools Soccer Complex.

Christensen was in the right place — in the middle of the 18-yard box, re-directing a miss-hit volley and placing it in the bottom right of the goal in the 75th minute.

"It was crazy," Christensen said. "It's like one of those moments when everything Zens out and you see the ball, the goalie and the goal, and you just put it in the corner and hope it goes in. And it did for me."

The Hilltoppers face top-seeded Albuquerque St. Pius X, which survived a 2-1 overtime win over Chaparral, in tonight's 6 p.m. semifinal at the APS Soccer Complex.

Los Alamos (15-8) was having flashbacks to its regular season match against the Chargers on Sept. 17, when Academy came from behind to take a 3-2 win at Sullivan Stadium.

But rather than fold, Los Alamos did something else when Chase Snyder equalized the score for the Chargers — 1-1 — in the 48th minute.

"I think we remembered that and we got angry and didn't want that to happen again," Christensen said.

The Hilltoppers opened the scoring in the opening minute of the second on a clean strike from senior Paul Hemez.

"Getting that goal early in the second half, you definitely feel a lot better," Christensen said. "Being up a goal early in the second half makes you play better. After that goal, our heads picked up and we thought, 'We're in this.' "

Los Alamos head coach Evan Gartz said Academy (14-7) clogged up the Hilltoppers' attack for much of the match.

"We knew they were aggressively going after us and we tightened that up and second half the momentum was there," he said. "They shut us down in the middle (in the first half) but we cracked their defense a couple of times and that's all we needed."

Gartz said the earlier loss to Academy served as a good motivator for his team.

"We talked about that (loss)," he said. "We wanted to keep that in the forefront of our minds and that gave us what we needed that game was a big part of our success. I was happy the way we responded."