SHORELINE — While the defense was there for a half, the Cougars’ offense never showed up.

The Lakewood girls soccer team left a 3-0 Cascade Conference loss to King’s Sept. 15 with more questions than it had opening the match.

“We had some breakdown in communication in some places,” said Lakewood manager Jeremiah Wohlgemuth. “And that has to improve because we were making decisions that were counter productive.”

In a rare defensive breakdown, the Cougars allowed three goals in the second half. Two of those goals came from King’s earning 1-on-1 or 2-on-1 situations. The game-deciding goal came just three minutes into the second half by Anisa Uberuaga, who knocked the ball in from just inside the goal box after the Knights’ original cross passed the goal mouth and was redirected by Beth Stella.

“I just thought that they came out after halftime with a definite game plan and stuck to it,” Wohlgemuth said. “They just kept attacking and moving the ball around and we had trouble with it.”

King’s scored again in the 52nd and 60th minutes, marking just the second time in three years that a Lakewood defense allowed more than two goals in a match.

Despite posting a clean sheet during the first half, Lakewood conceded possession to a King’s team that was as physical as any team the Cougars are likely to see this season.

“It’s  not a style that we haven’t seen yet,” said Wohlgemuth about King’s being able to push his girls off the ball. “The difference between them, Burlington-Edison, Mount Vernon and Cedarcrest is that they were able to back up that physicality with a finesse game — winning the ball and then distributing it where they needed.”

Meanwhile, the Cougars weren’t able to mount much of an attack, neglecting to put a shot on target in 80 minutes.

Their best scoring chance came from a cross by Anna Kuchler that skipped through the penalty area and just past a pair of Lakewood runners who would have had nearly the entire net to work with.

Lakewood fell to 1-2-1 on the season.