NAPPANEE — The Panthers’ first game of the new year yielded them their first Northern Lakes Conference win of the season.

The home team started fast on the way to a double-digit halftime cushion. Visiting Wawasee had the edge in the second half, but NorthWood held off the Warriors for a 48-36 win at the Pit Friday night.

“We’re very fortunate to play in the Northern Lakes Conference and have a lot of respect for Wawasee and their coaching staff. Any time that you get a win in our conference, we feel very good about that performance,” said NorthWood coach Aaron Wolfe.

The Panthers knocked down 5-of-6 field goals and all five of their free throws in the first period. After a trio of early ties, they closed out the period on a 13-4 run to take a 19-10 lead into the second quarter and never once trailed on the way to their second straight win, the team’s first back-to-back victories since a pair of games with Muncie Burris and Triton back in November.

“I thought we played strong in the first half. In the first quarter we had some players that were able to execute very well,” explained Wolfe. “I thought we passed the ball well in the first quarter, and a lot of those were assisted baskets so it looked like our ability to be unselfish and create shots for our teammates allowed us to get off to a pretty good start.”

The Warriors’ defensive struggles led to some offensive pressing in the first half, meanwhile. Wawasee converted just 6-of-22 shots (27 percent) before the intermission and trailed 29-15 at halftime.

“We’re going to look at ourselves in the mirror on that one because I thought our defensive energy wasn’t there, and we feed off of our defensive energy,” said Wawasee coach Jon Everingham. “So when we struggle defensively to find that energy that it takes to be competitive in the NLC, that translated to our offense. We got frustrated, and we started shooting some bad shots.”

Down but not totally out, the Warriors made a run in the second half.

The visitors pestered the Panthers into five turnovers in the third period — the bulk of their 13 turnovers for the night — then used some interior offense by Ethan Hardy in the fourth to cut Wood’s advantage to seven with 5:09 left to play. But NorthWood answered back with six straight points and held off their guests, handing Wawasee its second straight loss.

“The first five minutes of the third quarter, I thought offense, defensive rebounding were not as sharp as they needed to be, especially coming off of what was a very good half. We were fortunate to have enough cushion from the first half to be able to weather that type of play in this game,” said Wolfe.

“I thought we did in the second half what we wanted to do the whole game. We came out with some defensive pressure. Austin Miller got a couple steals, and we made it tough for them in their half-court offense,” Everingham said. “It takes a lot of energy and effort to compete in the NLC, and our guys are learning that it’s very, very difficult to go out there and play hard and put forth that much effort for 32 minutes but you have to.

“For 16 minutes tonight we feel really good about our development as a basketball team. Unfortunately, the game is 32 minutes long.”

NorthWood sophomore Ben Vincent collected a game-high 13 points as the only player with double-digit offensive production as both teams did their scoring by committee.

Matt Dutkowski was close with nine points for the Panthers, while Jason Borkholder put up eight points as the duo combined to go an ultra-efficient 8-of-9 from the floor Friday night. Trent Edwards also finished with eight, and Nick Bean scored seven for Wood (5-6, 1-1 NLC).

“I think that this has been a basketball team that has been balanced and scores by committee, and I think they’re very focused on taking what the defense is giving them. Sometimes that’s going to be perimeter shots, and sometimes that’s going to be interior play,” Wolfe said. “As long as we continue to share the basketball, it’s very refreshing as a basketball coach when none of our players are worried about who is doing the scoring.”

Bennett Hoffert remained a consistent offensive presence for the Warriors (3-7, 0-2 NLC) with nine points, followed by Miller with eight, then Hardy and Michael Hammer with six points apiece.

“This is hard maybe for people to hear, but we’re still in the developmental stage of some players,” Everingham said. “We’re trying to be patient with some development of some guys, and Michael Hammer came in and did some real nice things tonight. He’s been a JV player; this is his first game on the varsity so you could see his development. Ethan Hardy with his ability to potentially get the ball inside. We’ve had absolutely no inside scoring this season until tonight in the second half.”

Meanwhile, in Friday’s opener, Wawasee’s JV edged out its hosts in a 36-34 thriller.

The game was knotted at 34-all until freshman Keaton Dukes knocked down a long jumper from the wing at the buzzer to lift his team past NorthWood.

Ethan Carey and Jackson Stover each finished with 11 to lead the JV Warriors. Cooper Wiens put up 11 for the Panthers, while Caleb Schwartz and Jamarr Jackson each scored nine.

NorthWood plays at Northridge next Friday night, when Wawasee also hits the road for another NLC match-up at Elkhart Memorial.