NAPPANEE — Through three games this year, the Lady Panthers hadn’t allowed a single goal by an opponent. On Thursday, visiting Warsaw slotted away not just one, but two in Nappanee.

Brenna Buhrt did a little bit of everything for the visitors, and Warsaw’s possession game wore NorthWood down as the Indiana Soccer Coaches Association 3A, No. 16-ranked Tigers scored late in each half on the way to a 2-0 Northern Lakes Conference victory in Nappanee.

It wasn’t that NorthWood played poorly — the Panthers did plenty of things well, pointed out both NorthWood coach Phillip Ummel and Warsaw boss Jon Hoover. It’s just that it takes an awful lot to keep these Tigers off the board.

“Warsaw is very strong, and we knew we were going to have to play our best to keep them off the board and give us a chance to win tonight. And we played well, no mistaking that, but unfortunately ‘well’ is not good enough against a team that good,” said Ummel after the loss, his team’s first of the year.

“I felt like tonight our team worked really hard. NorthWood is a really good team,” said Hoover. “They caused some problems for us in the midfield. They pressed hard. They made passing lanes difficult to find. But it was just like a puzzle — I feel like our team worked through it; they solved it. They moved things around, and they made it work.”

The basic philosophy of this year’s Warsaw squad is to own the ball, and the Tigers were certainly stingy with their possession Thursday, leading to some lopsided stat lines. The visitors were disciplined in keeping their shape on the field, patient building up out of the backfield, and they finished with 13 shots on goal compared to just four by the Panthers.

Kira Robinson made 11 saves in goal for NorthWood, but with so much offensive pressure, the levee was bound to break at some point. After more than 37 minutes of stalemate soccer, Buhrt finally broke through for Warsaw early in the 38th minute when Abby Steffensmeier played the ball back to her after a run deep into Panther territory, and Buhrt deposited it inside the near upper V to put Warsaw on the board.

It took the Tigers more than 37 minutes to break through again, but they finally got some breathing room in the 75th minute when Buhrt played a through ball to Audrey Grimm in space inside the box, and the freshman forward finished it off with a hard, high drive just past the outstretched hands of Robinson for some late insurance.

“Her first goal on varsity. Excellent finish. Just tucked it away and stayed composed on the ball,” said Hoover of Grimm’s goal. “But hat’s off to the ball being played in by Brenna Buhrt. She was phenomenal tonight. Our team is just solid from top to bottom, but tonight in my mind she was the best player on the field.”

“We talk all the time about the importance of the first five minutes of a half and the last five minutes of a half, and giving up two goals in the last five minutes of each half is disappointing, for sure. But I don’t want to take anything away from our girls; I thought we defended very well. Warsaw is an incredibly talented team, and not many teams are going to keep them off the board this year,” Ummel said.

While Buhrt was everywhere for the Tigers, Robinson stood out patrolling the net for NorthWood. The junior goalkeeper finished with 11 saves under pressure all night, including back-to-back, quality stops within a short span in the 59th and 60th minutes — the first on a volley from in close by Grimm and the second on a low drive from just as close by Anna Sullivan.

“She has great hands. Her freshman year she was pretty new to the game and barely played before, but we were in need of a JV goalie and she was willing to come out and play for us,” said Ummel of his keeper. “She just has a great skill set, and our goalkeeper coach Danae Ehret has just done a phenomenal job with her.”

Warsaw moves to 3-2-1 overall after a season-opening stretch that has included four Class 3A Top 20 teams in Fort Wayne Carroll, Valparaiso, Hamilton Southeastern and No. 1 Penn. The Tigers are also off to a 2-0 NLC start in Hoover’s first season at the helm of the program.

“This group is working hard. We want to get through conference and have a good showing, but we just don’t want to settle,” he said. “We got to play Penn a few weeks ago, and we played them really well in the first 15. We just decided we’re not going to settle against any team that we play, so we come out and we want to play every team like they’re Penn and take every game seriously. Every game we play from here on forward, we’re going to walk into like we’re playing a conference championship match, and we’ll be better for that.”

NorthWood, meanwhile, slips to a 3-1 start to the season and 0-1 in the NLC. While Ummel knew how good Thursday’s opponent was, he wasn’t making excuses for his team, and the Panthers weren’t playing for second place, either. And it’s because of that that their coach is confident they’ll bounce back.

“Seeing how disappointed that they were is enough for me. Them knowing that they could win against a team like that lets me know how good they think they can be, and they’ll come back tomorrow ready to work at that and get better and get to the point we know that we can be,” Ummel said. “Losses are never fun, and no one enjoys them. But they’re already learning from it and moving on from it, and I think we’ll be better because of it.”

Also Thursday, the Warsaw and NorthWood junior varsity teams played to a 1-1 draw. Tobey Avey scored in the 23rd minute to stake Warsaw to an initial 1-0 lead, and Amari Peete netted the equalizer in the 38th minute.