By Theodore Tollefson

The Hastings Raiders Girls Soccer team had one of the busiest game schedules this week for Hastings High School sports, playing three games against non-conference opponents.

The Raiders Girls Soccer team opened their week up playing at home on Todd Field against the Farmington Tigers. The Raiders entered the game with an 0-2 record on the season while the Tigers had won their first two games against Northfield and Rochester Century to start the season. Both teams were entering their third games of the year and all had been nonconference to that point.

The first fifteen minutes of the game went scoreless as the Raiders and Tigers midfielders went back and forth keeping the ball at the 50 yard line. Then, when Raiders goalie Ava Doffing looked to have a save in her hands, Tigers midfielder Ava Johnson snuck behind Doffing to score the first goal of the game.

The game remained scoreless through the first half. Raiders midfielder and senior captain Bella Meier took an elbow to the back of her neck on a play with two and a half minutes remaining in the half. The results of the play had Meier on the ground for a few minutes. Thankfully though, she was able to get up and off the field on her own power and was ready to start the second half for the Raiders.

The second half of the game was more of the same for the Raiders, with more goal attempts that kept getting saved perfectly by the Tigers’ goalie Ayden Gagner. With only three minutes remaining in the game, the Tigers midfielder Amelia Theirl was able to score the second and final goal of the game, making the final score 2-0 in the Raiders’ third loss of the year.

After the game, Head Coach Scott Meier spoke on the game and the week ahead, “Both teams had some abilities getting up and down the field in different ways and put challenges on our defense. I think our defense did a really good job. More so than the first two games of things better organized, staying in space, I felt like they did a pretty good job of collapsing on the ball better tonight. They were up more on the player stepping in closing. We have players in spaces that were nice and vulnerable. We just didn’t connect and we didn’t finish. We had a disallowed goal that’s really unfortunate, because I think at that point, we had a lot of momentum building in that part of the half that I think that could have been a big big impactor for us,” said Meier.

For Thursday, September 2, the Raiders Girls Soccer team headed to the North Shore to face off against Duluth Denfeld Central in their first of two games in the Twin Ports. The Raiders game against Duluth Denfeld Central did not end in either a win or a loss, but a scoreless tie. The 0-0 tie for the Raiders brought their overall record to 0-3-1 for the season. The Raiders had made 12 goal attempts throughout the game, all of which were saved by Duluth Denfeld Central’s goalkeeper, Kaeley Larsen.

Friday afternoon brought on a match up for the Raiders against Duluth East High School. The first half of the game was scoreless for both teams, and the goals came along for both teams in the second half of the game. Unfortunately for the Raiders, they fell short yet again on goals in the second half scoring two while Duluth East scored three. The three to two loss brought the Raiders record to 0-4-1 on the season.

The Raiders Girls Soccer team will play their next game Friday against Tartan High School at McNamara Stadium at 7 p.m. Their game against Tartan is their first conference game of the season.