And while a first-up loss like that always stings, it let the side know what kind of a level it needs to be at to succeed in 2021.

Seven days later at Orange Hockey Centre, Ex-Services used the lessons they learned in round one to defeat cross-town rivals CYMS as Barrett was understandably stoked with the result.

"That's the level we need to be playing at," Barrett said.

"The game against Panthers in the first week shocked our system and we upped our training plan and we were more mentally ready for the task this week.

"We were all ready to rumble and our perspective changed after that first game."

A lot of things went wrong during the opening round, but Barrett said the side clicked into gear on Saturday, particularly on the attacking front.

"We had a lot of goal scoring opportunities on the weekend but it felt like we didn't have any in that first game," she said.

"That's a credit to our defence too."

Enthusiasm is something every captain wants to see, but Barrett thinks her girls can be type hyped up at times.

"Every game we go into we just go full send," she said.

"We give it 100 percent but sometimes that takes away from our structure.

"We need to stay composed and stay consistent. That's something we've been working on for years."

Sian Kennewell, Kylie Watts and Emma Corcoran all drew praise from the captain as she dubbed them as some of the better performers in round two, although the entire team did well.

It's only been two weeks but looking down the track, Barrett wants her side make the finals more comfortably than they have in previous seasons.

"We're always that team that's scraping in and sitting fourth or fifth," she said.

"We want to be able to make the semis easily. We're getting the numbers to training."

In the other games around the league, Souths drew with St Pat's 2-2 as Sarah Watterson and Millie Fulton each scored a double.

Nic Milne's United side lost to Lithgow 1-0.

In the men's competition, Orange Wanderers bounced back with a 4-3 victory over Parkes.

Lithgow Storm produced another victory, although it was trickier this time around. They defeated St Pat's 4-2.

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