The Brownwood Lions surrendered a trio of first-half goals and, despite a spirited effort, were unable to climb out of that hole as they suffered a 3-2 loss to the San Angelo Lake View Chiefs Tuesday night at Gordon Wood Stadium.
“We started the game well, we knew the competition was a tough team that hasn’t seen a defeat all season,” said Lions second-hear head coach Michael Westerman. “We knew it would a difficult game and the first few minutes we looked great. But we had some issues clearing the ball defensively and they took advantage of it.”
Lake View scored 6:53 into the contest, then added a second goal with 22:11 left in the first half. At the 11:13 mark of the opening half, the Chiefs boosted the lead to 3-0.
“They were sending long balls and we were having issues dealing with it and when we did it put them in position to score and they converted three times,” Westerman said. “In the second half we did a much better job of cleaning up those simple things and being able to get rid of the ball.”
The Lions shaved the deficit to 3-1 by halftime as Raven Prado scored his first goal with 68 seconds left in the half, emerging from a crowd in front of the goal following a free kick.
Then, with 12:51 remaining in the contest, Prado scored again as he broke free from the Lake View defense and slammed a kick into the bottom left corner of the net from 20 yards out.
“That was that eagerness of wanting to score, wanting to compete,” Westerman said of the rally. “We were extremely disappointed in ourselves at halftime because we hold the bar so high for ourselves. Being down 3-0 was very upsetting and we understand that’s not the kind of team that we are. We understood the assignment, we knew what we had to do to come out and compete and that’s what it takes to score, everyone buying in and gambling on the attack.”
Brownwood had a couple of scoring opportunities in the closing minutes that could have forced a tie, but the Lions were unable to complete the comeback.
The Lions (3-5-1) will look to bounce back at the Burkburnett tournament where they will be in action Thursday, Friday and Saturday.
