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The Huntland High School Lady Hornets beat the Community Viqueens 3-2 on the road Thursday in their first game of the season.

The Lady Hornets took an early lead and held off multiple rally attempts from the Viqueens to secure a district victory to start the year.

Huntland head soccer coach Amanda Tipps said she was pleased with her team’s overall effort, highlighted by strong performances early in both halves.

“I thought that we came out aggressive, scored a few really early, and I thought we did well. Then I felt like in the second part of the first half, we kind of sat back. We came out in the second half strong again and were able to score,” she said. “We hit the goalie multiple times and we had lots more opportunities than we finished with, but overall, I’m pretty pleased for the first game.”

The Lady Hornets got on the board about 10 minutes into the game as Piper Cox received a pass from Hazel Reed, dribbled into the goal box and fired a shot into the net to give Huntland an early edge.

The Lady Hornets were awarded a penalty kick a few minutes later with Raegan Johnson nailing the attempt to make it a 2-0 game with 27:25 remaining in the first half.

The Viqueens answered back shortly afterward as they turned a breakaway opportunity into their first goal to put the score at 2-1 with 24:28 left in the half.

The Lady Hornets led 2-1 at halftime.

Hazel Reed added to the lead about three minutes into the second half as she maneuvered past Community’s charging goalkeeper and tapped the ball into the empty net after receiving a pass from Cox to put the score at 3-1.

The Viqueens remained in the game, however, as they scored again with about 28 minutes to go to cut the lead back down to one.

The Lady Hornets had two narrow misses with about 18 minutes remaining as a shot from Cox across the goal box bounced off the left post, and a penalty kick by Reed shortly after deflected off the crossbar before being cleared away by Community’s defense.

The Viqueens made multiple attacks on Huntland’s goal in the final minutes, but the Lady Hornets held them off to win by one.

With the win, the Lady Hornets opened the season with a record of 1-0.

They will next play Monday at Cascade High School. Kickoff is scheduled for 5:30 p.m.