Elianna Meyer registers hat trick as Unioto defeats McClain in season opener

GREENFIELD — The McClain varsity girls soccer team lost to Unioto 4-1 Friday, Aug. 14 at home in what was both teams' season opener.

McClain is coming off a record-setting season from a year ago but lost several senior starters to graduation and will be in rebuilding mode for most of the season.

Things started well for the Lady Tigers when senior Larah Henson scored the first goal of the game with just 18:18 left in the opening half, but Unioto answered a few minutes later on a goal by senior Elianna Meyer to tie the game and the first half ended with a 1-1 deadlock.

“I thought we played really hard in the first half, and I didn’t really know what to expect,” McClain head coach Blain Bergstrom said. “At halftime, even as hard as we played, I told them we still have another 40 minutes to play.”

All the scoring in the second half belonged to the Lady Shermans as they netted three more goals, including two more by Meyer, which gave her the hat trick for the game.

“Despite giving up the three goals, I thought we still played pretty well in the first five or 10 minutes of the second half, but after that I thought it was some conditioning and a few little mistakes that we can work on to get better, that really hurt us,” Bergstrom said. “Still, I’m just so proud of my girls and how they played in the first half tonight. We are a really young team with very few returning starters, so we have to learn how to finish all 80 minutes, not just 40.

“Unioto is a really good team with eight returning starters, and their goalie is very good, and that makes it really hard to compete against when you have so many inexperienced kids, but we can only get better.”

The Lady Tigers (0-1) next play at home against Logan Elm on Tuesday, Aug. 18 with a 7 p.m. start time.