Michigan Tech midfielder Reilly Lovercheck battles with a Davenport defender during a game Friday at Kearly Stadium in Houghton. (David Archambeau/For the Gazette)

HOUGHTON — Looking to build off a strong weekend that saw the Michigan Tech Huskies soccer team earn a draw and a win last weekend, the Huskies returned to the friendly confines of Kearly Stadium Friday night. They struck first just under 17 minutes in, but surrendered the next three goals in a 3-1 loss to the Davenport Panthers.

“(This was) a tough one,” said Huskies coach Melissa Kuhar. “We came out, and scored a good, kind of scrappy goal, which was nice, and then kind of just got away from our game plan, got out of our vibe and what we were looking to do.

Kuhar said that while the Panthers were searching for their first win of the season, they played with the type of urgency that the Huskies have not yet figured out.

“They were a hungry team wanting their first win of the season, and our girls knew that they were going to come out hard,” she said. “We just kind of got away from who we were.

“We were creating things, but just not doing it the proper way. So, yeah, their second goal was a banger. So, two goals we probably need to clean up. We shouldn’t have given up.”

Sophomore midfielder Bella Vasoli got the Huskies on the board in the 17th minute, when she converted off a free kick by senior defender Olivia Gette at 16:56.

“It was a solid crash-in,” Kuhar said. “We were able to kind of capitalize on that. A great ball played in by Gette, I believe, and Vasoli just kind of got on the end. Their goalkeeper kind of bobbled it.

“We capitalized, which was nice, but we just didn’t create enough kind of in the run of play. We had some chances, but just maybe, maybe not enough.”

The Huskies followed up that goal with two other scoring chances, but neither shooting attempt ended up on net.

Four minutes after the Huskies’ tally, the Panthers evened things when Ella Chatfield got the ball over Sofia Capoccia in traffic and she fired off a kick that got past the Huskies keeper, Bri Barrows.

The Huskies had another great look a little over three minutes later when Gette fired a free kick into the box, but freshman midfielder Peyton Wetzel turned to quickly get a shot off, and she narrowly missed the net.

About a minute later, Jordan Kerns put the Panthers in the lead when she beat Barrows with a kick into the top left corner of the net.

The Huskies had two more looks in an eight-minute stretch, but both kicks ended up wide of the net.

For the third straight game, the Huskies turned to senior keeper Ludesha Reynolds in the second half of the game. She was called upon to make five saves in her time on the field, and three balls got past her, but only one ended up in the net.

Chatfield scored at 67:05 when she got to a ball that was kicked in from the corner and she battled until she could kick it through traffic and in.

Gette had one more look for the Huskies in the late stages, but her free kick from about 30 yards out was stopped with just seven minutes left in the game.

“It’s just work,” said Kuhar. “You have to put in the work, right? Continue day after day to just kind of try to keep honing in on some of the things we need to clean up. We worked a lot on the attacking third, and it’s going to take time.

“We have a group that’s new playing with each other. You can’t blame it on the youth. It’s just they’re new players playing around each other, and so it’s just kind of figuring out each other’s tendencies. But, I just stood out there, and our standard has to be higher.”

Kuhar said that the Huskies have to keep working to improve.

“That’s something that the players have to own,” she said. “If we can’t get our standard to be higher, we’re going to give up goals that aren’t great. We’re going to not be able to finish chances.

“So, we’re getting there.”