EMMAUS - Between a difficult early schedule and weather that has made practice time tough to come by, the Northwestern Lehigh girls lacrosse team has struggled out of the gate.

The Tigers picked up an opening day win over Northampton, but since then have run into three teams with a combined record of 17-3 so far this season.

The result is a 1-3 start to the season and the promise of better days ahead.

The latest setback came at the hands of Emmaus on Friday evening at Memorial Field as Brianna McClain scored six goals in a 16-4 Hornet victory.

“I think we learned we have a lot of things we need to work on, and it’s been difficult because we are playing teams that are really good and we haven’t had great weather to work on things in practice, so that makes it difficult,” said coach Jess Bahnick. “I think playing these tough teams will help us eventually, but it’s been a tough start.”

Emmaus jumped out to a quick 2-0 lead just 90 seconds into the game. But Northwestern wasn’t going to go down without a battle as Cara Thomas scored with 9:36 left in the first quarter to cut the Hornets advantage in half.

After Emmaus added to its lead, the Tigers responded as Olivia Costa scored with 5:20 left in the first half and Sydney Wright scored just :26 later to tie the game at 3-3 at the end of the first quarter.

Emmaus (3-3) - which has also opened with a difficult schedule, playing back-to-back games against EPC powers Pleasant Valley (7-0) and Easton (5-0) and then a game against Wilson West Lawn from District 3 - made some adjustments between quarters and they made a difference.

The Hornets scored 11 unanswered goals over the second, third, and fourth quarters to take a commanding 14-3 lead, which forced a running clock because of the 10-goal rule.

Northwestern finally ended the Hornet run when Costa added her second goal with 4:55 left to play tin the game to make it 14-4. Emmaus’ McClain added two more goals to set the final.

“We have been playing a little better and I think we are playing better as a team. Something I have been really big on this season is developing the teamwork and I think we are starting to do that,” said Bahnick. “We’ve done better at working together but I think we are still slacking at times, and we have to keep working on that as we go.”

UP NEXT ... Northwestern has games on three straight days next week as they play at Southern Lehigh (3-1) on Tuesday, and Parkland (2-2) on Wednesday before hosting Liberty (3-3) on Thursday.

UPS AND DOWNS … As things stand now, Northwestern will have played six straight games against teams with at least a .500 record when they face Allentown Central Catholic (1-4) on April 15th.