Having earned a more favorable seed this year, the Warrenton soccer team was hopeful of ending a one-and-done district losing streak that spans back nearly a decade.Able to avoid vaunted St. Dominic in the first round of the Class 3 District 8 Tournament, the Warriors were matched against an opponent they had played to a narrow penalty-kick defeat earlier in the season.But Warrenton hadn’t saved its best effort for last, showing gaps in its game during a 2-0 season-ending defeat in which they could never establish an offense.“We gave them a lot of chances,” said Coach David Evans. “In the back of our minds we kind of thought since we played them on grass the first time, that playing on turf would be an advantage to us. We just didn’t come out and give them the respect that we should have right off the bat.”The Warriors battled Hannibal to a scoreless game until the 10:48 mark of the first half, when the Pirates placed the ball just above goalkeeper Kalee Kelly’s reach.“They came out and played a good game,” said Evans. “We played them kind of soft in the first half.”He felt his team improved its showing in the second half, but it wasn’t enough to overcome the deficit.“For the most part, in the second half we played a little better,” said Evans. “Our goal was to get the ball played up over the top to Colleen Bayer and let her get some takeaways. Sometimes when you’re sprinting toward the goal you just don’t have the legs to put the ball exactly where you want it.”Hannibal added its second goal soon into the second half, putting a damper on the Warriors’ season. A program that had been hopeful of reaching double-digit wins and establishing a new watermark in its coach’s final year couldn’t overcome its early letdowns.“They played us with multiple players in the zone, and we had trouble adapting to defensive changes,” said Evans. “They had two or three people running in the same space, and our girls would stick with their person to a fault, and that left people open.”Evans says he had aspirations of the Warriors winning 15 games, but they ended just shy of half that mark with seven victories.“It was a tough loss,” said Evans, who is leaving to become the athletic director at Wright City. “They didn’t give up, and everybody continued to go hard.”WARRENTON SOCCER FALLSDerrick Forsythe photo.