Cranston West’s regular season finale didn’t carry much weight last Thursday: win or lose, the Falcons were already assured the third seed in Division II South girls’ soccer. A win over second-ranked Exeter/West Greenwich wouldn’t have hurt though.

Instead West turned in an uneven performance on Senior Day, scoring first against the Scarlet Knights before allowing three consecutive goals en route to a 4-2 loss. And while the loss had no impact on the Falcons’ playoff standing, it seemed to take a mental toll on West’s players.

“The girls are upset, they’re hanging their heads right now,” West coach Charles Pearson said after Thursday’s game. “But they shouldn’t be. This game didn’t mean anything. Win or lose, we were going to Smithfield anyways. If they lose against Smithfield in the playoffs, that’s when they should be upset.”

As Pearson indicated, the Falcons [6-8-2] will travel to Smithfield, the No. 2 seed from the North, for the D-II quarterfinals tonight at 7:30. The Sentinels [11-1-4] beat West 5-1 in the only regular season meeting between the two teams. And for the Falcons to come away with a different result tonight, they’ll need a more consistent effort than they got against EWG.

Things started well enough in last week’s match against the Knights as West got on the board in the first 10 minutes. Senior captain Sam Nolte executed a perfect corner kick, sending the ball on a line to teammate Ashley Della Ventura in the box. Della Ventura connected on a header, redirecting the ball past EWG goalie Olivia Tourgee and staking the Falcons to an early 1-0 lead.

“We’ve been practicing corner kicks all year and today we got a perfect one,” Pearson said. “But that was seven minutes into the game and, after that, it seemed like they thought that was all that they had to do today. We made a lot of mistakes.”

And it didn’t take long for the Knights to capitalize on them. Immediately following Della Ventura’s goal, EWG drove into West’s territory and evened things up with a score from junior Brooke Lepage. The Knights didn’t create many scoring opportunities, but they took advantage of the ones they got. Exeter scored on goals from Jessica Lawler and Chelsea Neves-Carr over the next 10 minutes to take a 3-1 lead.

“There were seven shots and four of them were goals,” Pearson said. “And the three in the first half seemed to be obvious kick-away balls. But we were flat, we were shorthanded and we got caught in the box. And you have to give EWG credit: they were in the right spot at the right time.”

West junior Lexy Pagliarini cut into the team’s deficit before halftime, lifting a floater over the head of Tourgee, but the Falcons wouldn’t get any closer. The Knights got a second-half insurance goal from senior captain Hayley Kenyon and held on for the 4-2 win.

The Falcons used the Senior Day finale as a chance to get their entire roster in the game as Pearson rewarded his reserve players with extended minutes. But West also seized the opportunity to rest its starters, and make some significant lineup changes, before the postseason.

Goalie Tayla Reo, the team’s starter all season, was charged with allowing the Knights’ first three goals and was replaced by sophomore keeper Danielle St. Pierre in the second half. After the game Pearson announced that St. Pierre would serve as the Falcons’ starter in the playoffs.

“St. Pierre has earned the right to be the starting keeper in the playoffs,” Pearson said. “We talk a lot about how if you keep working hard, it will eventually pay dividends. And [St. Pierre] is a classic example of that. Her work ethic has been escalating all year and she earned the right to represent us in goal against Smithfield.”

West will make its seventh consecutive postseason appearance when the team heads to Smithfield tonight at 7:30. But, unlike recent years, the Falcons won’t go into the playoffs with the burden of a top ranking. Since 2005 West has been the first- or second-seed, this year they enter as the No. 3 team from the South and fifth-seed overall.

“There is no pressure on us,” Pearson said. “In the past there’s been a lot of pressure, but not this year. I told them in August that we are a great team but we have yet to see it. Now the playoffs come down to a one-game season. We have to leave it all on the field.”