The way Seabury Academy’s boys basketball team executed in the first and fourth quarters Friday night, Elwood shouldn’t have had a chance at victory.

Yet, the Seahawks’ struggles in the middle 16 minutes made sure that not even a monstrous rally could help them climb out of the huge hole they dug as they lost, 59-51, to the Panthers at home.

“We’re a team that is trying to learn how to play a complete game,” said Seabury coach Marcus Heckman, whose squad slipped to 5-12 after the setback and has three games remaining before regionals.

“I really would have liked to have seen what would have happened if we could have played the whole game like we did the beginning and end.”

The stats seem to suggest the Seahawks would have stood a pretty good shot at victory. After all, Seabury outscored Elwood 40-28 in the first and fourth quarters.

But Seabury’s downfall was it’s sluggishness in the second and third periods, when it scored just 11 points. Meanwhile, the Panthers put up 31 — including 11 from Bret Shackelford, who shared game-high scoring honors with Seabury’s Grayson Dillon with 17 each.

Seabury’s middle deficiency was more than the difference despite a Seahawk rally that featured them trimming a 25-point, second-half deficit to nine with 45 seconds to play.

However, any real opportunity at a victory ended when Seabury’s Adam Davis, who added 15 points, missed an off-balance three-pointer after Elwood missed a pair of free throws.

“Elwood is a great team,” Heckman said, “and in a game against that caliber of opponent, we have got to learn to play a complete 32 minutes.”

Seabury girls 38, Elwood 7

This one was over from the start as Seabury (7-9) jumped to a 17-3 first-quarter advantage.

From there, junior Regan Sisson took over, scoring a career-high 11 points. Seabury’s Laura and Lane Frizell added eight apiece.

“It’s kind of difficult to take a lot from a game that becomes so lopsided,” Seabury coach Nick Taylor said. “But I was more than pleased by Sisson’s play and also by that of some girls on our bench.

“Another positive is that we really started off strong, and that was something we had not been doing lately.”