When Lawrence High soccer coach David Platt heard Shawnee Mission West beat previously undefeated Olathe South, 6-1, on Wednesday night, he couldn’t have been pleased.

“Shawnee Mission West is an extremely good soccer team,” Platt said after his team’s 5-2 loss to the Vikings on Thursday at the Youth Sports Inc. fields. “They are very experienced. The last three or four years, they have been one of the top teams in not only the league, but the state. They have had a lot of experience with winning.”

Not Platt’s squad, which has only five seniors on the roster as LHS is trying to rebuild its program with 10 sophomores and 11 juniors spilt between the JV and varsity.

The loss dropped the Lions to 1-4, but Platt was pleased with his team.

“Our identity is still being established,” Platt said. “We are just trying to improve game in and game out. Even though we lost, we took a big step forward in this game.”

The Lions took a 1-0 lead in the 28th minute when junior John Rosskopf stole the ball and rifled in a long shot. SM West goalie Anthony Drath came out to cut down the angle but missed the ball as it sailed into the right corner of the net.

The LHS lead lasted less than two minutes when a penalty kick was awarded to SM West after a takedown in the penalty box. Senior Kyle Reynolds took the penalty kick and scored his first of three goals on the night as a diving LHS keeper David Liston couldn’t make the stop.

“I started to go left, and then came back to the right, hoping to throw him off,” Liston said of the penalty kick. “He kicked it pretty much right down the middle, but I couldn’t get back in time to get a hand on it. He might have read me, but I’m not sure.”

LHS re-took the lead 2-1 just two minutes into the second half when junior Michael Valverde broke in for a short shot that beat Drath.

“His goal was spectacular,” Platt said. “Michael is a kid that has worked so hard this year to just be positive and get after it. He has been a critical leader for us in a lot of ways because he fills so many different slots. He does everything for us, and I was just very happy to see him get rewarded with that rocket of a shot that he had. He is a super kid.”

Once again the lead was short-lived as Reynolds broke in for his second goal of the game, the first of four unanswered goals by SM West. He beat the defender and let a shot go from the right side that eluded a diving Liston. After a goal by senior Kevin Curry, Reynolds secured his second hat trick in as many nights when his shot dropped into the top-right corner of the net.

“Kyle is amazing,” Shawnee Mission West coach Gordon Wetmore said. “He is a funny forward, because he doesn’t do everything that we want all of the time, but he has a good nose for the goal.”

LHS will play host Monday to Olathe North.