BERRIEN SPRINGS — There was a time when the Brandywine girls basketball team would be in trouble if the outside shots were not falling.

But times have changed for the Bobcats, who went into the paint to pull away from host Berrien Springs in their 50-31 BCS Athletic Conference Red Division opener Friday night.

Brandywine, which is known for its outside shooting and pressure defense, was struggling with both in the opening half against the Shamrocks. Veteran Bobcat coach Josh Hood addressed both things at halftime.

“I was pretty disappointed in the first half with our post presence,” Hood said. “We didn’t finish very well, and when the threes are not falling, we have to be able to dominate inside. That was our biggest key for tonight. We thought we had an advantage inside, and we were very soft. I challenged the girls at the half, especially our couple of post players, to take over the paint. We did a good job of that in the third quarter.”

Leading 28-19 entering the third quarter, Brandywine turned up the defensive pressure and starting looking more inside to Kennedy Byrd and Alexis Rhodes. Both responded with 10 points each as the Bobcats outscored Berrien Springs 22-12 in the second half to improve to 2-0 on the year and 1-0 in the Red Division.

“For us being a 3-point shooting team and a pressing team, we’ve been short on a lot of our 3-pointers right now,” Hood said. “We aren’t performing at a level right now that warrants a lot of success. We’ll see what happens next Tuesday. They return most of their girls from that team. It’s gonna be a heckuva game.”

Brandywine will face its toughest challenge of the year on Tuesday when it hosts Kalamazoo Christian, who like the Bobcats, were at the Division 3 regional last year.

Senior Zakiyyah Abdullah had a huge first half with 17 points. She kept the Bobcats in the contest for the first 16 minutes. Sister Malikiyyah Abdullah had a strong second half along with Rhodes and Byrd, as she scored 11 of her 13 points in the final 16 minutes.

“I was really proud of her,” Hood said of Zakiyyah. “We go through her. She put us on our backs when we weren’t shooting the ball particularly well. I thought she did a great job for us getting in the paint and setting the tone in the first half.”

One of the things that Brandywine will work on moving forward is putting pressure on the teams defensively. Hood knows that defense could make the difference against the Comets Tuesday night.

“We are not feisty enough right now,” he said. “I explained to the girls after the game, in 11 years with the Brandywine program, when we take the court is should be chaos, and we should be imposing our will. We should always win the energy battle. Again tonight, I am now sure for 32 minutes we won that battle.”

Hillary Dortch led the Shamrocks with 12 points.

No other Berrien Springs player reached double figures.