When it comes to evaluating the U.S. national team, federation president Sunil Gulati is nothing if not measured.

In a vacuum, a run to the Copa America Centenario semifinals represented a successful performance by the U.S. national team. But the 4-0 loss to Argentina on Tuesday at NRG Stadium provided a stark reminder of the Americans' place in soccer's hierarchy.

"Tonight was obviously a rough night against a terrific team," Gulati said. "We got dominated tonight. Getting here was an accomplishment, and it doesn't feel quite the way it did a few hours ago."

The U.S. failed to put up much of a fight against the world's No. 1-ranked team, conceding a third-minute strike to Ezequiel Lavezzi and never finding a way back into the game, with Lionel Messi firing home a stunning free kick and Gonzalo Higuain adding a second-half brace.

It marked the second loss of the Copa America for the U.S., which also conceded an early goal en route to a 2-0 defeat to Colombia to open the tournament. U.S. coach Jurgen Klinsmann was steadfast in his opinion that the Americans played well in the opening defeat, but the loss to Argentina represented a more comprehensive setback.

Although pulling off the upset against Argentina always was going to represent a tall task, previous results — including a win over Spain at the 2009 Confederations Cup and friendly victories against Italy, Germany and the Netherlands under Klinsmann — showed it wasn't beyond the realm of possibility.

"How the team plays, wins and losses obviously are part of it, players making progress — all of those things" are a part of the evaluation, Gulati said. "But you can't base those things on one game, especially when you're playing a team like this.

"Today is a good day to judge where we are in the program overall. We're obviously a long way off — we knew that going in. But we knew we were a long way off when we beat Spain in 2009 or Germany or Holland last year, so those things can happen. That's obviously what you were hoping for today."

While the Americans' competitive run at the Copa America began and ended with defeats to South American powers, the U.S. sandwiched those disappointments with consecutive wins over Costa Rica, Paraguay and Ecuador. Winning Group A was no small accomplishment, and the U.S. achieved its pre-tournament goal of advancing to the semifinals.

Now one final test awaits: Saturday's third-place match against Colombia or Chile in Phoenix.

"We don't base decisions on one game, whether it's today or one win against Ecuador," Gulati said. "We look at all of this and we'll do that after the tournament is over and assess where we are and how we've done. Obviously the three consecutive wins was good. Today and the Colombia game were less good.

"The semifinals are the teams that are ranked 1, 3, 5 and 31 in the world. We're still going to play a top-five team on Saturday — let's make that part of the overall assessment."