The McKinleyville Panthers feature a very new-look team in girls soccer this fall, but that doesn’t mean they’re not ready to make some noise in the Big 4 in the coming weeks.

The Panthers kicked off conference play on Wednesday with a tough assignment at Fortuna, a team that reached the North Coast Section championship game a year ago and one that is expected to compete for this year’s Big 4 crown.

And they matched up well against the talented Huskies, before eventually falling 2-0.

Despite the loss, head coach Brady Burtchett liked as lot of what he saw from his team, which features mostly first-year players.

“It was a competitive game,” Burtchett said. “We both had opportunities. They finished theirs and we didn’t finish ours.”

With just five returning players and 11 girls playing high school soccer for the first time, the early season has been a period of adjustment for the Panthers.

However, there has been some notable bright spots and plenty of improvement through the opening few weeks of the campaign.

“We have a lot of new players,” the coach added. “And they keep getting better every week.”

One of the returning players, Grace Pimentel, has been helping the newcomers and was one of her team’s players of the game on Wednesday.

“She set the tone for us physically,” Burtchett said of the tenacious Pimentel. 

The McKinleyville defense also turned in a strong performance against a Fortuna attack that is expected to be among the best in the H-DNL this fall.

Sweeper Ahty Allen was particularly effective on the back line for the visitors, helping to anchor the unit at sweeper.

“(Fortuna) looked good, we just had two mental mistakes that cost us,” Burtchett said. 

The improving Panthers will take a break from conference play when they travel to play another team that looks ready to surprise some people this fall.

On Saturday, the Mack girls will head to Crescent City to take on the Del Norte Warriors, who kicked off the Little 4 with a nice 5-2 win at South Fork on Tuesday.