LINDEN — The game started like many Brighton girls basketball games.
The Bulldogs took a 22-9 lead at the end of the first quarter and pulled away from there, beating Linden 66-43 in the season opener for both teams.
But coach Paul Ash had plenty to consider, especially his team’s youth and defense.
“We’re not where we need to be at defensively,” he said. “We don’t communicate, we’re late in rotations, but execution is something you can fix. The effort was there.”
And the youth. Brighton has three returning player from last season and has three freshmen and two sophomores on the roster this season.
“Those kids are up to play,” Ash said. “We didn’t bring them up to sit and watch other kids play. We’re going to play those young kids.”
One of the youngsters, freshman Sophie Dziekan, had a team-high 12 points. She was part of a balanced attack that saw five players hit double figures.
“We should be that type of team all year,” Ash said. “I think we should be able to get scoring from different people throughout the season. We have seven kids who can score, which is a nice luxury to have. We haven’t always had that at Brighton.”
Senior Julianna Pietila, one of the returners, had 11 points and 10 rebounds for the Bulldogs.
“We started out good for our first game,” she said. ‘It surprised me. We’re deep and we did well for our first game, I thought.”
The Bulldogs weren’t challenged down the stretch, but Linden’s Sterling DeGayner did her best, scoring all 17 of her team’s points in the fourth quarter and finishing with 24 overall.
But the Bulldogs matched her basket for basket, for the most part.
“It was a real good effort,” Ash said. “We know there’s going to be ups and downs. What I like is that there’s great energy. If you give me great energy, the execution will improve, hopefully. If we do our job as coaches, it will improve as the season goes on. For the first game, I’m very pleased.”
The Monday start gave the Bulldogs an extra day of practice before they head to Petoskey for an invitational later this week.
“It starts the season out good,” Pietila said. “We have good competition right off the bat. We have good teams to play against and it gets us ready for the teams we’ll go up against during the season.”
And that’s what Ash was thinking about when he was talking about his defense.
“We know how good Hartland is,” he said. “We know how good Howell is. We know how good Pinckney is. Our division is brutal this year. So we know that tonight’s game is to get ready for division play. Right now, I’m not sure how many division games we would have won with that defensive effort, or execution, I should say.”
