HUMBLE — Port Neches-Groves had not scored a goal in four consecutive trips to the UIL 5A Region III girls soccer tournament.

After scoring late in their past two playoff wins, the Indians found themselves in a back-and-forth shooting match with 2018 state semifinalist Kingwood Park before halftime Friday. The Panthers, though, tacked on three more goals in a 14-minute span and earned the return trip to the regional final with a strong second half in a 6-3 win at Humble High School’s Turner Stadium.

Kingwood Park will face either Nederland or Pflugerville at 11 a.m. Saturday for the regional championship and a trip to next week’s state tournament in Georgetown. PNG (19-6-5) was eliminated from the regional semifinal for a fifth straight year.

“It’s a thorn on my side because the top four teams come here, so it’s a high-level soccer match,” PNG coach Aimee Bates said. “It’s very high-level for us, and it just wasn’t our time, but they took us one step further by scoring, so we just have to keep hoping for the best. It’s hard to get to the regional tournament.”

PNG scored the lone goal with 11 seconds left against Richmond Foster and two in the final 10 minutes against Texas City to get to Humble for the fifth year in a row. The Indians weren’t waiting around to get on the board on an overcast day, thanks to Breeana Riggs.

The junior, who was the Indians’ savior against Foster, scored twice in the first half, once on a direct kick and another on a penalty kick in a physical first half.

PNG placed emphasis on taking a much faster start, according to Riggs.

“We focused a lot on it in practice,” Riggs said. “We would have dummies and have our coaches push us around just to be ready for this game. I think it helped a lot coming into this game.”

But Kingwood Park had Allie Byrd.

A recent North Texas signee, Byrd recorded a hat trick in this round for the second year in a row. She made a penalty kick in the fifth minute of the match and headed in a corner kick with 4:51 left before halftime to break a 2-2 tie.

Byrd assisted Leah Hoyt on a goal with 33:54 left in the match to expand the lead to 4-2 and earned her hat trick at 31:21.

“I thought we did a good job on holding Allie Byrd, although she got that PK and she got that header,” Bates said.

Kassandra Brown rebounded a stopped Ariel Muller shot and pulled PNG within 5-3 at 28:26, but Jacqui Daspit got into the score column with a KP goal at 19:50.

It took “all guts,” Bates said, for the Indians to score again in the second half.

“They could have easily given up the second half, and they went after it and kept going,” she added.

Taylor Debrosky sailed a 45-yard direct kick just into the right corner of the net with 17:02 left before halftime to put the Panthers (25-2-1) in front, 2-1.

Almost 10 minutes later, things got ugly.

The Panthers drew a yellow card after freshman Emma Zumo took a violent hit to the head and left with a bloody nose. Fifteen seconds later, at the 7:35 mark, Riggs was shouldered to the ground and converted a penalty kick.

Riggs embraced Ariel Muller, one of four PNG seniors, as the two shed tears in defeat. Izzy Volk, Mia Delgadillo and Brown are the other seniors.

“It is probably one of the worst feeling you can ever feel,” Riggs said. “Knowing you’re not going to get to play them again, it hurts. It was an awful feeling.”

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I.C. Murrell: 721-2435. Twitter: @ICMurrellPANews