NILES — Brandywine returned to the court following the holiday break with 62-30 domination of Lakeshore Tuesday night.

Despite what the scoreboard said at the end of the game, head coach Josh Hood felt the Lancers outplayed his undefeated team in the first half.

“In my 11 years at Brandywine, you can probably count under 10 times when a team is more passionate and has more energy than us,” Hood said. “Lakeshore did that today in the first half.”

Brandywine ended the first quarter with an 11-10 lead over Lakeshore after failing to sink shots from outside the 3-point line, and struggling to defensively stop the Lancers with a full-court press. Senior Kennedy Byrd had five of the Bobcats’ points after rebounding under the basket. Senior Megan Schmidt scored the first 3-pointer of the game with 2:06 remaining in the first quarter.

In the second quarter, Brandywine started to take control as senior Zakiyyah Abdullah continued got hot, and Lakeshore fell into foul trouble. The Lancers also missed numerous layup opportunities, contributing to the Bobcats’ takeover.

However, Hood felt like the team’s 17-day break showed.

“We play when we have to, and that’s the game in the first half,” Hood said. “We went through the motions. We got outworked again.”

Brandywine started to pull away in the third quarter, opening up a 43-23 advantage. In the fourth quarter, the Bobcats’ defense allowed Lakeshore just seven points, while scoring 19.

Abdullah ended the night with a game-high of 18 points. Schmidt, known for her defensive minded-demeanor, ended the game with 13 points.

For Hood, a win is nice, and he praised his team for their shooting, but his focus has already shifted to the future with a goal of figuring out how to motivate his team for the full 32 minutes.

“Having 17 days off is not an excuse,” Hood said. “The first half of the season, we used the excuse that we missed the first week of practice because volleyball was in the regionals. There are no more excuses.”

In the Bobcats’ victory over Lakeshore, the seniors scored a combined 44 of the 62 points. Hood is hoping the seniors leave it all out on the court moving forward.

“We have five seniors that I hope figure out the end is near,” he said. “March is coming upon us and their basketball career is over. I hope they seize the moment and I hope they figure that out.”

As Brandywine prepares to take on Benton Harbor and Buchanan next week, Hood will work on conditioning.

“I thought we did quite a bit of that over break, but tomorrow there won’t be a lot of basketballs touched in this gymnasium,” he said.

Hood will look to continue the mission of working with his team to play a full 32 minutes of basketball, a mission he believes begins with himself.

“I hope these girls figure out real soon that if you just turn on the switch when you want, it’s going to come back to bite you,” he said. “We show great strides for 15 or 16 minutes, but the other 15 and 16, I sometimes wonder what we do in practice. The coach has to get better. That’s a start.”