Twenty-seven seconds into the game, the UW-Eau Claire women’s soccer did something it hadn’t done for a week: score a goal.

However, that one goal was all they could muster up in a 2-1 loss at the hands of Concordia-Moorhead (Minn.) Saturday afternoon in front of 125 people at Bollinger Field. The loss was the first of the year for the Blugolds.

After being outshot 12-5 in the first half and going into halftime down 2-1, the Blugolds rebounded and outshot the Cobbers 5-3 in the second half to give themselves a chance to win.

“What we try to do is learn from every game,” head coach Sean Yengo said. “We played hard in the second half, and now we just have to figure out how to get that equalizer.”

A big emphasis for the week in practice was getting out to a fast start, Yengo said. Two young freshmen answered his call.

Jackie Nailor took a pass from fellow freshman Fallon Peplinski into the back of the net for a goal in the opening seconds of the contest.

Peplinski said it was really good to see the offense get out to a hot start.

“We wanted to come out with high intensity because we’ve been lacking that in the past couple of games,” Peplinski said. “We came out of the gate really strong. There’s a lot of good to take out from this game.”

Nailor found a crease in the defense and got the pass from Peplinski for her first career collegiate goal. Naylor credited a lot of to the pass from her fellow classmate.

“In practice, we talk about the long balls to the flanks,” Nailor said. “Fallon (Peplinski) played an amazing ball, it was a great pass.”

Concordia-Moorhead got two unassisted goals from junior Marta Prosinski, including an arcing ball from way out to give the Cobbers the lead for good.

Yengo said although it was a good shot, the Blugolds could have avoided the issue.

“We cleared it right to the middle of the field, and when you clear the ball, you’ve got to get out of that danger zone,” Yengo said.

At the end of the first half, it appeared as if freshman midfielder Jocelyn Etten netted that equalizer Yengo was talking about, but the Blugolds were called for an offsides penalty that took the points off the scoreboard.

“I’ll have to look at it on tape, but I was a bit surprised to see the flag up,” Yengo said of the offsides penalty.

Concordia-Moorhead also had a goal called back due to an offsides penalty.

Goalkeeper Ninah Behrenbrinker, a senior from St. Paul, Minn., collected eight saves in the contest for the Blugolds.

Despite the loss to the non-conference opponent, Peplinski said the team is still confident heading into conference play next weekend.

“We definitely need to work on capitalizing on our opportunities when they happen,” Peplinski said. “But I’m really looking forward to seeing how this WIAC season is going to turn out.”

The Blugolds will face Wartburg College in a non-conference match Wednesday afternoon in Waverly, Iowa, before starting conference play Saturday against UW-La Crosse.