It’s a good day to be a Shorian — the Lake Shore basketball team opened their season with a home victory over the Utica Chieftains, 47-39, on Tuesday, Nov. 26.

Coming off a 6-18 season, the Shorians were slow out of the gate on Tuesday, but so were the Chieftains — the score was just 6-6 after the first quarter, and that tally jumped to 15-15 at halftime.

Luckily for Lake Shore head coach Mike Jackson, it didn’t take much to diagnose the team’s early game struggles.

“Just talked about making shots (at halftime),” Jackson said. “I think we missed a lot of shots, and then just showing up on our defense. Making sure we stopped them from doing a little pick-and-cut that they were doing and rebounding the ball. We felt if we could do that, we can pull away a little bit.”

Jackson was right — while they burst out of the locker room by more than doubling their first half production with 16 points in the third quarter, they held Utica without a field goal, leaving the Chieftains to get all of their third quarter points via the free throw line.

Lake Shore’s Max Miner helped jumpstart their third quarter production with eight points (two 3-pointers) on 3-of-4 shooting before Adam Rash, who was playing in his first game back after tearing his ACL last season, added all seven of his points in the fourth.

The Shorians needed it, too, as the Chieftains finally started getting the ball in the basket, though their 18-point fourth quarter wasn’t enough to close the gap.

“We had so many open looks,” said Utica head coach Dave Hinkle. “I don’t even know what our shooting percentage was. … We felt like we let them off the hook tonight by missing a lot of shots, and credit them because they took advantage of those misses and they made them when it counted.”

Senior Ja’Sean Dean led the Shorians with seven first-half points and parlayed it into an 11-point outing, leading the team. Miner had nine points, Brendan Manor and Rash had seven, Jason Pruitt had six, Steven Likins four and Luke Lemke two.

While Dean will be expected to continue chipping in throughout the season, It’s Pruitt and Miner — both of whom are juniors — who could help raise Lake Shore’s ceiling as they contend in the MAC Gold.

“Ja’Sean (Dean’s) been here four years,” Jackson said. “He’s a senior, so he kind of knows what we’re looking for. He knows what to do down the stretch.

“Jason (Pruitt) is still learning; a junior, him and Max (Miner) — they’re still learning. Both had great summers. Super talented, and we feel like we can put them on our back and they can take us home and win some big games. They are our best one-on-one players.”

Utica’s lineup on Tuesday looked nothing like the one that went 22-3 last season — every one of their major contributors from that team has since graduated, including four who are currently on college basketball rosters.

It provides a major shift in the program with major minutes and production open for the taking as they navigate their new placement in the MAC White.

“I was excited about the intensity, effort, just the energy we brought,” Hinkle said. “We’ve been inconsistent in practice, and that’s one of our main things, because that’s a must in our Utica program. And I thought we brought that tonight, which kept us in the game when we shot (poorly).

“It’s going to be a collective effort. You don’t replace what was lost. You got four guys playing in college for basketball. You got other college athletes, football and this and that, right, that like you’re not replacing that. You got to do it as a whole team.”

Utica junior Hayden Hirmiz led all scorers with 14 points, 12 of which came in the second half. Caston Rissman had 11 points, including making the team’s only two 3-pointers of the night. Alex Bosilkovski had six points, Javeion Redditt had four points, Elijah Coffee added three and Malik Cross-Nelson and Eddy Tohme each had one.