The Hermiston girls soccer team had allowed two goals the entire season prior to Wednesdays conference match with Hood River Valley.

They allowed three to the Eagles on Wednesday which resulted in a 3-0 loss, the Dawgs first of the season.

Twenty-two seconds into the match, HRVs Roxana Gomez was able to sneak one past Hermiston goalkeeper Hope Butler and that turned out to be all the Eagles needed to take down the previously undefeated Dawgs.

For the entire match, it seemed when Hermiston would start a build-up from the back to mount an attack, bad luck or some stout HRV defending would turn the chance away before it ever got traction.

I dont think we were focused as Hood River, Hermiston first-year coach David Hurtado said. We werent on our game today. They [Hood River] was a little bit more physical than we were and won a lot of the 50-50 balls.

The Dawgs had three golden opportunities in the first half to equalize, but all three shots from Mikaela Rodriguez were stopped by the Hood River Valley goalkeeper.

The last of the chances came literally within inches of being a goal.

In the 29th minute, Hermiston midfielder Maggie Coleman served a ball into the penalty area with perfect pace, but Rodriguez couldnt get much of a whisper of a touch on it and the HRV keeper was able to stop it from completely crossing the goal line.

Hood River Valley kept the Dawgs out of their passing and possession game by basically doing the same thing. Crisp passing kept the ball away from the Dawgs, which inturn caused the Dawgs to press a little too much when they had the ball on the attack.

We just gotta work harder, Hurtado said. We can definitely play with them, and well see them again.

The Eagles did a very good job at keeping forwards Rodriguez and Angel Aguayo at bat by forcing the attack to try to find width in the final third of the field.

Normally, attacking teams start out wide in the flanks and feed the ball toward the middle where the forwards are to knock it in the net.

The loss dropped the Dawgs to 7-1 on the year and 1-1 in the Columbia River Conference. They are now rated No. 13 in the Class 5A OSAA power ratings and will play host to a Pendleton team Tuesday that pounded The Dalles Wahtonka, 5-0, on Wednesday.

For the year, Hermiston has scored 28 goals and allowed just five. 

Hurtado knows this isnt the end of the world for his club, and the players know that as well. 

One game isnt going to ruin our season, Hurtado said. The pressure is off us now to stay undefeated, and now we can just go out and play.