There is an old saying in sports that goes like this: “It wasn’t pretty, but winning ugly is better than losing.”

There are probably a lot of area basketball fans saying those exact words after the game between the Brandywine Bobcats and the Bridgman Bees in girls’ varsity basketball action from Friday night.

The Bobcats hosted the Bees in a Lakeland Conference match-up that saw both teams struggle to score points in the first half, and the second half wasn’t much better as the Bobcats won 45-23. With the win, the ’Cats improved to 5-0 on the young season, and extended their Lakeland Conference unbeaten streak to 20 games.

In the first half both teams struggled to find a rhythm.

It took nearly three full minutes before anyone would put points on the scoreboard with the first score coming from Bridgman’s Rachel Swords. Brandywine would follow with two 3-point bombs from Carlie Newman to give the home team a four-point lead.

Two baskets by Bridgman’s Lindsey Lowery and another bomb from Newman would make the score 9-6 at the end of the first quarter.

The second quarter wasn’t friendly to either team as the two squads combined for seven points in the quarter. Bridgman got two from Niki Strefling and one from Lowery, while the Bobcats would get one from Lauren Leonard, and two each from Morgan Smallwood, Madison Pellow and Kelsey Prestly bringing the halftime score to 16-9.

Ironically the missed shot count exactly matched the scoring in the first half.

“It’s the first time we have seen the 2-3 zone this year. We looked really good against it in practice, but it is hard to simulate it when we don’t play it,” Bobcats coach Josh Hood said. “We’ve got to do a better job of trying to simulate a 2-3 zone in practice, and our girls have got to do a little better job in practice of playing against a 2-3 zone, even though we don’t do that in our program.”

The second half picked up a little bit as the home team outscored the visitors by a tally of 12-6 in the third quarter.

Prestly led the way with four in the period, but over a stretch of four minutes (to end the first half and begin the second half) she had scored nine straight points for the Bobcats.

In the third stanza the Bobcats also got 3-point baskets from Newman and Mackenzie Shelton, while Pellow chipped in with two more.

Brandywine led 28-15 heading into the final period.

“You have to give Bridgman a lot of credit, they had a game plan and they slowed the tempo down,” Hood said. “For us it’s all about defense and pressure, but when you are not scoring it’s hard to get into full court pressure.”

Prestly took over for the Bobcats in the final stanza as she scored 10 of her game-high 16 points including 4-of-5 from the charity stripe. Newman contributed 15 points in the game, including four baskets from long range, and Pellow added six points.

Lowery led the Bees with six points, while Sword and Lisa Bowman each added four.

The Bobcats improved to 4-0 and they will play South Bend St. Joseph on Tuesday night at Brandywine before heading to Detroit for the Motor City Shootout after Christmas.

BRIDGMAN 23

Lindsey Lowery 2 2-4 6; Lisa Bowman 2 0-0 4; Mikayla Lechnet 0 0-0 0; Rachel Stemm 1 0-0 2; Taylor Tuszynski 1 0-0 2; Niki Strefling 1 1-2 3; Alyse Newman 0 2-2 2; Rachel Swords 2 0-0 4. TOTALS: 9 5-8 23

BRANDYWINE 45

Carlie Newman 5 1-2 15; Rachel Ort 0 0-0 0; Morgan Antus 0 0-0 0; Mackenzie Shelton 1 0-0 3; Kelsey Prestly 5 6-8 16; Morgan Smallwood 1 0-3 2; Lauren Leonard 0 3-4 3; Madison Pellow 2 2-4 6; Siranda Lary 0 0-0 0. TOTALS: 14 12-21 45

Bridgman 6 9 15 23

Brandywine 9 16 28 45

3-point baskets: Bridgman 0, Brandywine 5 (Newman 4, Shelton). Total fouls: Bridgman 16, Brandywine 9. Fouled out: Swords (BRIG). Varsity records: Bridgman 2-3, Brandywine 4-0