Tough weather adds to offensive frustrations

At one point, Powell High School senior striker Heston Swenson waited for what seemed like an eternity for a passed ball to fall from the sky.

The Panthers waited nearly as long for their offense to show up. And when it did, it was too late.

Host PHS was forced to battle violent winds as well as visiting Pinedale on Saturday, and lost on both fronts as the Wranglers handed the Panthers a 2-1 season-opening loss.

“The wind didn’t help at all, but we’re not really using that as an excuse to get out of the loss,” PHS senior defender Alex Bjornestad said of winds that sent dirt and sand flying across Panther Field for the duration of the game. “We’re running a new formation (1-5-3), we have new people that are starting and we haven’t played together that much. But still, we could’ve dug ourselves out of the hole ... we just put ourselves in a bad position.”

The Panthers (0-1) allowed Pinedale (1-1) to dominate their side of the field for most of the game. The Wranglers managed two shots on goal in the first seven minutes of play, and finally broke through when Matheus Berg ricocheted a low kick off PHS goalie Sean Wagner’s body that landed in the right corner for a 1-0 Pinedale lead in the 12th minute.

“That first one, I definitely should’ve had it,” Wagner said. “I didn’t sleep much [Saturday] night because I couldn’t stop thinking about that one. They came in and I wasn’t in the right position.”

Wagner said the harsh wind made it tricky to defend his net, but like Bjornestad, he refused to use that as a scapegoat.

“It kind of looked like we gave up and didn’t want to be there, and [head coach Travis Rapp] wants guys that want to be out there,” he said.

Rapp said Pinedale is a program that has been improving over the past few seasons, and PHS didn’t show up prepared to handle those improvements.

We got outplayed,” Rapp said. “We didn’t show up with enough intensity and didn’t the control the ball enough in the first half.”

Pinedale extended its lead to 2-0 when Michael Castro fielded a corner kick and pushed it past Wagner with less than a minute to go in the first half.

The two teams switched sides after the intermission, but Powell couldn’t take advantage of the change in direction. Even with the wind helping their passes and shots in the second half, they failed to threaten the Wrangler net until the very end.

“I’m not blaming anything on the wind — we didn’t come to play at all,” Swenson said. “Pinedale was playing in the same weather, and they just made better of it than we did.

“They obviously had nothing to lose, and they played like that,” he said. “And that’s honestly how we need to play.”

PHS sophomore and midfielder Owen Dent netted a corner kick late in the game that accounted for the final score.

Powell will get a chance to rebound Thursday when it travels to Cody to battle the 1-0 Broncs at 6 p.m.

“We just have to forget about the Pinedale loss and go 1-0 this week,” Swenson added. “Cody is always a fun rivalry game ... there’s always a little extra tension or hype around the game and it’s always a battle.”

Rapp said the Panthers will spend their three days of practice leading up to Thursday working on possessing the ball and finishing offensive possessions, something that was lacking against Pinedale.

“Cody is going to be a tough game, they’re always a tough team no matter where their program is at,” Rapp added. “They always play us tough.”