By ALEX SPONSELLER The Toll Gate girls soccer team came up short in a tough 3-2 loss to visiting Rogers last weekend during the team’s senior night celebration.

Trailing 3-1 midway through the second half, the Lady Titans would get a goal from Cassie Cirella to narrow the lead to 3-2. Although Toll Gate would pressure Rogers in the final minutes and see multiple shots hit the crossbar, the Titans were unable to close the gap as they fell short.

Toll Gate took a quick 1-0 lead in the first half on a goal from Olivia Dutra. However, Rogers would score in the final minutes to knot things at 1-1 at the break.

Rogers came out hot in the early portion of the second half and would get two more scores, one of which was on a penalty kick, to jump out to the 3-1 lead.

Cirella and Dutra also recorded assists in the loss while keeper Maddie Clark finished with eight stops in net for Toll Gate.

“The last few games we have been focused on scoring. We’ve got the defense down, we are moving the ball well across the middle, getting it out to the wing, the communication has been great, but we just cannot push it through the net. The opportunities are there but we are still trying to get over that hump. We’re fighting, and once we do get over the hump it will be a little easier, but we just need to figure out a way to put it in the net,” said Toll Gate interim head coach Robert Enright.

Enright was pleased with his club’s execution despite its inability to score in the final minutes. The Titans peppered the Rogers net in the final four minutes of action, but were unable to get the tying score.

“Most of it today was bad luck. We were able to get it through our gaps to our strikers, we changed our formation which gave us more opportunities and allowed us to pressure up the middle, so we fixed a lot of the issues we had (strategically) but now we just need to get it in the back of the net. Today was 70 percent bad luck, we just had some tough bounces,” said Enright.

Overall, with the playoffs set to begin next week, Enright is optimistic about the club’s chances of earning a playoff spot.

“I felt that we controlled much of the game for the most part, but we had about a 10-minute lull in the middle that we needed to fix. We need to figure out how to play for a full 80 minutes. I’m happy though, I see us going in the right direction and we should be able to push for the playoffs. We just need to lick our wounds and get back at it these last two games.”

The Titans would go on to face Tiverton on Sunday and finished with a 1-1 tie. Cirella scored Toll Gate’s lone goal which was assisted by Mackenzie Costa.