In a home-and-away stretch over Thanksgiving break, the Grand Valley State women’s basketball team dealt No. 2 Lewis its first loss of the season a 71-63 victory inside Fieldhouse Arena, and bested Gannon 80-76 in Erie, Pennsylvania on Saturday afternoon.

The Lakers (4-1) seized control of the lead over Lewis (5-1) halfway through the second quarter and wouldn’t relinquish it. GVSU led by as many as 16 points nearing the end of the third quarter.

The Flyers managed to rally and cut the deficit to three points, 55-52, with 6:58 remaining, but the Lakers shut the door by making shots and hitting free throws down the stretch to claim a quality victory.

“(Lewis) is really good team, don’t get me wrong, but preseason rankings are preseason rankings,” said GVSU head coach Mike Williams. “Nick Saban says it — ‘they don’t mean anything, it’s the end of the year that counts.’”

Lewis outscored GVSU in the first, second and fourth quarters. The Lakers’ 25-12 outburst in the second quarter proved to be enough.

GVSU continued to rely heavily on the 3-point shot, and did so early in this contest, draining 10 of 26 from behind the arc. Four of those came in the first quarter with redshirt junior Bailey Cairnduff knocking down two triples to get the Lakers’ first six points.

Coming into these two games, GVSU was ranked 14th in the country with just over nine 3-point field goals made per game.

“That’s what we do. We have got kids that can make shots,” Williams said. “A lot of times that’s what the other teams are giving us, so we’ll take them and we made them.”

Cairnduff led the team in scoring with a season-high 21 points and snagged six rebounds and three steals. Senior guard Brionna Barnett wasn’t far behind with 19 points, including five 3-pointers with a couple off step backs on the dribble and one from deep behind the line.

When GVSU wasn’t lighting it up from deep, the Lakers were crashing the boards. The Lakers collected 11 offensive rebounds – their fourth consecutive game of double-digit offensive rebounds.

Sophomore center Korynn Hincka grabbed six rebounds in only nine minutes playing time.

The defense held Lewis to a season-low 63 points after the Flyers had just piled on a season-high 111 points against Alderson Broaddus three days earlier.

For the second part of their two-game stretch, the Lakers took to the road to match up against Gannon.

The Lakers’ offense helped them prevail in an 80-76 win over the Golden Knights (4-3), as they shot at a 47.5 percent clip as a team.

“I thought we defended OK, but any time we had a letdown defensively, they hit a shot,” Williams said. “I thought the same thing from our standpoint, we got great looks, and we made them. I thought we made great decisions offensively.”

Kayla Dawson had 20 points and six rebounds, and Piper Tucker scored 19 points on 7 of 7 shooting, including 5 of 5 from 3-point range.

“We moved the ball really well,” Tucker said. “Just passing the ball, having energy, getting the ball around the arc and moving it a few times before we take the shot helped us a lot.”

Barnett only had eight points on 1-9 shooting, and is shooting just 29.7 percent on the year. Williams said it’s not so much a slump, but rather the fact that opposing defenses center their energy on her, forcing other Lakers to step up.

“It was just one of those days where she had great shots, they just didn’t go in the basket,” he said. “You’re going to have those. When they’re keying in on her, she did a really great job moving the basketball and getting her teammates involved.”

Barnett leads the team in assists, and did so again against Gannon with seven.

GVSU has two-game homestead this week, and will host Ashland on Thursday and Lake Erie on Saturday to open GLIAC play.