Siloam Springs' girls did just about every right Friday against Mountain Home except put the ball in the back of the net.
The Lady Panthers dominated the possession and the game and scored just enough goals to come out with a 3-1 win in a 5A-West Conference match at Panther Stadium.
Head coach Abby Ray said she would like to see the Lady Panthers show a little more of an offensive fire in a game where they dominate the possession like they did Friday.
"We've told them every game that they have to flip the switch," Ray said. "We're a very happy, energetic team, but you have to flip that switch to be competitive and I don't think we ever flipped that switch tonight. We played great soccer. Everything we practiced carried through, but we never got hungry enough to score goals. I'm happy with our possession. I think we out-possessed them the entire game, but it's just a matter of finding the net."
One Lady Panther who did rise to the occasion offensively was junior Halle Hernandez who came off the bench to score two goals, one in each half.
Hernandez scored in the 16th minute to give the Lady Panthers a 1-0 lead with Madi Race getting the assist.
Bri Anderson scored Siloam Springs' second goal in the 44th minute, shortly into the second half on another Race assist.
Hernandez' second goal came in the 48th minute off a corner kick exchange from Karen Flores to Clara Church and back to Flores, who passed to Hernandez in front of the goal, who scored for a 3-0 lead.
"Halle has that hunger to score," Ray said. "She is a true goal scorer. She goes on to the field and wants to put the ball in the net every single time. That's why she got a couple tonight."
Mountain Home's lone goal came on a penalty kick in the 49th minute by Kenzie Hatman.
Other than that the bulk of the game was played on the Lady Bombers' side of the field. However, the Lady Panthers had trouble navigating the Lady Bombers' packed in defense at times.
"I give credit to Mountain Home for packing it in," Ray said. "You have so many obstacles in your way to goal that it just becomes difficult to get it to the goal, the more obstacles you have to get through. We just had a hard time breaking that down and figuring that out."
Ray said the Lady Panthers (4-2, 2-0) will work on figuring out those obstacles on Monday in practicing before playing Alma at home on Tuesday.
"On Monday we'll be practicing putting a lot of obstacles in the box and how do we score when other teams pack it in?" Ray said. "We're used to playing possession soccer. We're used to playing teams that run with us, and when a team doesn't run with us and they all pack it in, we've got to figure out how to overcome that obstacle. We'll practice that on Monday."
Fayetteville 1, Siloam Springs 0
Siloam Springs dropped a 1-0 loss to Fayetteville on Tuesday at Panther Stadium. It was the third Class 6A school the Lady Panthers have played in their first five games, along with Bentonville (2-1 loss) and Conway (2-1 win).