ROSS TWP — Rob Lombardo stood near the bench, arms crossed on his chest and a smirk of resignation on his face.

He had just watched the latest in a long series of turnovers committed by his Seneca Valley girls basketball team.

A team that was 6-0 up to this point.

A team that was still making mistakes.

“We make the same mistakes every game, every night, every practice,” Lombardo said. “We had 26 turnovers. You aren’t beating a quad-A team with 26 turnovers.”

Those mistakes and a poor 10-of-43 shooting night conspired to hand the Raiders their first loss of the season, 44-31, on the road at North Hills.

Lombardo, though, hopes this loss and the manner in which it came is a reality check for a team that was winning despite the foibles early this season.

“I’m hoping realization sinks in that you girls have to go to work,” Lombardo said. “They think they were good. Thinking it and doing it are too different things.”

North Hills, though, is no slouch and the Indians (4-2, 3-0) served notice again that they are contenders in Section 3-AAAA.

Jamie Halloran scored 17 points and also had a slew of assists and the North Hills defense was smothering all night.

Seneca Valley (6-1, 1-1) can be a match-up problem with the long and tall trio of Paige Montrose, Lexus Lambert and Erin Danik.

But Indians coach Lauren Wilmus sees her team of quick, shorter players who can all handle the ball as a match-up problem for other teams as well.

“We have five kids who can handle the ball and five kids who can shoot,” Wilmus said. “We just stressed to them that all five of them had to contribute.”

And they did for 32 minutes — almost out of necessity.

North Hills had a bench of one against Seneca Valley for all but the last 16 seconds.

Still, the Raiders were unable to wear those six players down.

In fact, North Hills seemed to get stronger as the game progressed, turning a 16-14 halftime lead into a double-digit lead at the beginning of the third quarter.

Seneca Valley never led in the game and could only get as close as eight points of the lead in the fourth quarter.

“I think they’re all realizing that, hey, we’re pretty good,” Wilmus said. “I always joke because we don’t look like a basketball team. We don’t have any 6-foot kids, but we’re scrappy and we work as hard as anyone else.”

Michaela Lamont was a bright spot for the Raiders with 16 points and an 8-of-11 night at the free throw line.

North Hills, though, held Seneca Valley’s leading scorer, Erin Danik, without a point.

The 6-1 junior came into the night averaging 15.2 points per game.

“To hold Erin Danik scoreless,” Wilmus said, “is phenomenal.”

Lombardo hopes eyes have been opened on his team.

“This section, it used to be you could win with 31 points,” Lombardo said. “But this isn’t that old section. I’m hoping this is the wake-up call. We can be a good team. We just have to clean some things up.”

SENECA VALLEY 31

Michaela Lamont 4-11 8-11 16, Brooke Lyczek 2-10 0-0 5, Paige Montrose 1-5 2-4, Lexus Lambert 3-7 0-0 6, Erin Danik 0-5 0-0 0, Kelsey Cruttenden 0-0 0-0 0, McKenna Gross 0-3 0-0 0, Carolyn Palaski 0-2 0-0 0, Toni Augustine 0-0 0-0 0, Ayami Harada 0-0 0-0 0. Totals: 10-43 10-15 31.

NORTH HILLS 44

Jordan O’Malley 2-8 0-1 5, Jamie Halloran 6-8 4-5 17, Anna Treser 2-7 1-3 6, Kristen Collins 0-3 0-0 0, Sierra Ungerman 4-8 3-4 9, Jess Bowen 2-4 1-2 5, Sarah Taschner 0-0 0-0 0, Leah Ussack 0-0 0-0 0. Totals: 16-38 9-15 44.

Seneca Valley 3 11 7 10 — 31

North Hills7 9 13 14 — 44

3-point goals: Seneca Valley 1 (Lyczek); North Hills 3 (O’Malley, Halloran, Treser)

JV: Seneca Valley, 32-8

Monday: Shaler at Seneca Valley