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NILES — Visiting Dowagiac spoiled the home opener for the Niles girls soccer team on its new synthetic surface at Viking Stadium with a 5-0 non-conference win Tuesday afternoon.

The Chieftains, who rebounded from its first loss of the season, led 1-0 at halftime against Niles.

Dowagiac made sure there was no comeback by the Vikings as it scored four second-half goals to improve to 2-1 on the season.

“Tonight was a bounce back game for us,” said Dowagiac Coach Chad Davis. “The girls responded well to a tough Niles team. I felt like it took us a long time to get going, but once we spread the ball around it opened up some opportunities to get some goals. So, I was proud of them fighting through adversity until we could figure out a way to put them in the back of the net.”

Scoring goals for the Chieftains were Maggie Weller, Faith Green, Jessa Davis, Johanna McDonald and Jenna Ward.

Dowagiac goalkeeper Triana Lee stopped all eight shot attempts by the Vikings. The Chieftains had 10 shots on goal against Niles.

Dowagiac also spoiled the debut of Niles Coach Jaycee Myer.

“Good first game,” Myer said. “We’ve had one practice as a team, and are just missing a few things. Once we put it all together and have more time to play as a team, our girls will excel.  We had several shots on goal, just couldn’t find the back of the net.”