Lawrence High’s girls soccer team played a full 80 minutes Thursday evening at the Youth Sports Inc. fields.

Unfortunately for the Lions, they were on the wrong end of a 5-1 defeat by Shawnee Mission Northwest.

“Well, we definitely can take a lot more away from this game than we did on Tuesday night,” said LHS coach Jason Clark, referring to his team’s 10-0 mercy-rule loss to Olathe North that lasted a little over one half. “We made some changes after Tuesday, and I think some of the girls definitely responded. There was some definite fire out there tonight that was missing.”

However, a talented group of Cougar forwards didn’t miss many opportunities, dropping LHS to 2-4 on the season.

Senior Lauren Isenhower connected on two goals in the first half around the 23-minute mark to put SM Northwest comfortably ahead.

Isenhower also had two assists on the night, the prettiest one a perfect pass to a running Rachelle Luster, who had only to tap the ball in the open net.

It looked for a moment like Isenhower had completed a hat trick when Northwest scored its final goal with 12:48 to go.

Luster shot a long crosser to the middle of the field that Emily Quigley appeared to slide at and miss; Isenhower appeared to have tapped in her third goal of the night.

However, it was Quigley who deflecting the ball just enough to get behind LHS keeper Carly Sakumura.

Lawrence High's Abby Vestal, left, takes a shot against Shawnee Mission Northwest as teammate Kelly Renfro watches. The Lions lost, 5-1, Thursday at the Youth Sports Inc. fields.

“Their forwards are really talented, and they were able to just hit some nice shots against me,” Sakumura said. “But I thought we hung in there and fought back.”

Clark agreed and defended his goalie, whom he said had little chance on a couple of SMNW’s kicks.

“Their forwards hit some really hard and well-placed balls where there was no way Carly could get to,” he said. “But I don’t think there would have been many goalies that could have gotten to those balls.”

Abby Vestal scored the Lions’ lone goal in the first half when she drilled a deep dead ball that flew past the SMNW goalie.

Clark applauded his team for its effort afterward.

“I think tonight we showed a total team effort, something that wasn’t there on Tuesday,” Clark said. “But, ultimately, we’re a team right now that is a few missed passes or 50-50 balls away from being able to compete with a team of their caliber.”