Draw sends U.S. soccer team back to the drawing board

The U.S. women’s soccer team won its group Tuesday but it didn’t win its game, with Colombia riding a pair of free-kick goals from midfielder Catalina Usme to a 2-2 draw in Manaus.

And for captain Carli Lloyd, there’s both good news and bad news.

“I think we met our objective,” Lloyd said. “We wanted to come out first in the group. That was first and foremost.”

So that’s the good news.

Now here’s the bad: The Americans looked unimpressive in doing so. Now they have just three days to fix it before the Rio Olympics quarterfinals begin Friday in Brasilia, where the U.S. will meet Sweden and Coach Pia Sundhage, the woman who guided the U.S. to its last gold medal four years ago in London.

“I’d rather this happen now to maybe light some fire under us and motivate us even more,” Lloyd said. “I’m not worried. We’re still going in the right direction. We got the job done.”

Barely. Although the Americans outshot Colombia, 16-3, they put three of those shots off the crossbar, three more over the crossbar and saw six more die in the hands of Colombian keeper Sandra Sepulveda, who had a marvelous game.

U.S. keeper Hope Solo? Not so much.

Solo gifted Colombia its first goal with a spectacular mistake on an Usme free kick from just outside the box in the 26th minute. The low, left-footed kick bent around the wall and hit the grass just in front of Solo, who let it squirt off her hands and through her legs.

“I’ve been around long enough to know these things do happen. They’ve happened to me before,” Solo said. “I have also learned to have a short-term memory. So I’m planning to put this behind me and move on. “

Her coach, Jill Ellis, offered the same advice – albeit a bit more bluntly.

“Crap happens. You move on,” she said. “She’s had a great tournament to date. She’s got to put it behind her and focus on her next game.”

Solo’s teammates quickly managed to do just that, erasing the deficit on a Crystal Dunn goal in the 41st minute and another from Mallory Pugh early in the second half.

On the first, Dunn knocked home the rebound of a Lloyd shot that Sepulveda had pushed off the crossbar. On the second, Pugh gathered an errant ball at the right edge of the penalty area, dribbled back across the front of the goal, then left-footed a shot into the net.

That made the 18-year-old UCLA recruit the youngest woman to score an Olympic goal for the U.S. It was also seconds away from being the game-winner before Usme bent in a second free kick from a difficult angle in the final minute of regulation, driving the ball over Solo’s outstretched arm and just under the crossbar at the far post.

And while the draw left the three-time defending Olympic champions unbeaten at 2-0-1, they’ve hardly looked unbeatable.

“In every tournament I’ve ever played in, nothing’s gone perfect. It happens,” Solo said. “And you have to get through [it] to hopefully stand on top of the podium.”

The road only gets tougher from here because if the Americans get by Sweden, their likely semifinal opponent will be Brazil, in Rio, before a hostile sellout crowd in the iconic Maracana.

Solo will have to rebound from Tuesday’s game if the U.S. is to have a chance at any of that. But as she left the stadium and headed for the team bus, she showed signs that was already happening.

“If I ever have kids, they will not become a goalkeeper,” she joked. “I don’t wish it on anybody. It is the most unforgiving position in all of sports.”

kevin.baxter@latimes.com

Twitter: @kbaxter11