LEBANON — A weight was lifted for the Lebanon High girls soccer team in its 3-0 win over Plymouth on Tuesday.

In recent games, coach Breck Taber felt as if there was some invisible barrier keeping the Raiders from capping any attacking push with a goal.

The ball could be a foot from the goal line and his team would struggle to convert, he said.

Taber has been preaching to his players that they “need to want to score,” adding that he didn’t want them to look back on a game lamenting on what they could’ve done differently in the final third.

But hosting Plymouth in its penultimate regular-season home match this fall, Lebanon finally broke past “the force field,” Taber said.

A trio of goal scorers and a stout back-line performance secured a victory for the Raiders, ending a three-game scoreless skid.

“This (win) gets out of a rut that we were sort of going through,” junior Sara Forman said. “We have such a great team here, we just need to play to our ability. Today, we definitely had a lot of great things that we saw here with our goals, which has been a real downer for us (lately). We can keep it locked down in the back, but we just need to put it in the back of the net.”

On the other end of the field, Lebanon’s defense and goalkeeper Maezie Angles have been “solid” all year, Taber said. The group produced a quality performance en route to another clean sheet, the Raiders’ seventh shutout of the season on Tuesday.

“It’s like having a starting pitcher that throws a no-hitter going into the eighth (inning) and his team doesn’t score a run,” Taber said. “We gotta give (the defense) some run support.”

Donning light pink warmup shirts and hot pink socks for the team’s annual breast cancer awareness game, Lebanon played an even opening 20 minutes with Plymouth. Both teams generated a few chances in the final third, though neither truly tested its opposing goalkeeper.

Five minutes after Angles’ diving save kept the game scoreless, the Raiders found their breakthrough tally shortly before halftime.

A ball from freshman midfielder Claire MacMartin found the feet of fellow first-year Addison Lucero on the left wing, who rifled a shot into the back of the net to give Lebanon a 1-0 lead heading into the intermission.

Two goals in a span of four minutes early in the second half, courtesy of Abigail Auch and Rowan Laundry, tied the Raiders’ season-high single-game scoring mark — they also scored three goals in a narrow victory over Keene on Sept. 26.

“So not only were they goals, but they were quality goals, like nice build-up goals — nice through ball, nice cross and finish,” said Taber, whose team has only dropped two of its last eight games. “We practice it a ton and it’s nice to see the end product.”

Following back-to-back scoreless draws on the road at Souhegan and Pelham, Angles admitted the team’s “been a little bit negative lately.” The win and the manner in which Lebanon scored should lead to an uptick in positivity, she said.

Junior Peyton Rutherford echoed a similar point postgame.

“Momentum with scoring goals, but also with the positivity in the team,” Rutherford said of the primary takeaways from Tuesday’s performance. “This will help a lot and practices will be uplifted.”

Lebanon has two games remaining on its docket before the regular season concludes: an away game at Merrimack Valley (4-4-4) on Tuesday and a home finale against Milford (4-4-5) on Oct. 25.

The Raiders currently sit 11th in the NHIAA Division II standings table, two points clear of Pembroke.

“It’s definitely the mindset,” Taber said of postseason qualification. “Because every girl out here wants the season to go longer, and you start looking at schedules and standings. I wish at this time of year that we don’t have to worry about it, but we still have to watch and do our job in the end.”

Alex Cervantes can be reached at acervantes@vnews.com or 603-727-7302.