The losing coach said his team worked really hard and that he was proud of its effort. The winning coach characterized his team's play as "up and down."

So it goes for Ypsilanti's and Chelsea's boys basketball teams in Ypsilanti's 60-48 win Friday night. Ypsilanti continued to roll, remaining undefeated in Southeastern Conference play, while Chelsea's struggles continued as the Bulldogs fell to 5-8 overall, 2-6 in the SEC.

Rebounding decided the game, with Ypsilanti (9-3, 6-0 SEC White) taking 18 more shots from the floor than Chelsea. There were times players like 6-foot-8 Jalen Johnson (6-foot-8), 6-foot-7 Lavonte Davis, 6-foot-6 Mamadou Ba and 6-foot-6 Marcus Palmer were running their own tip drill as Chelsea struggled to keep them off the offensive glass.

MLive.com: Boxscore

"We're not very tall to start with," Chelsea coach Robin Raymond said. "When you have three or four of them (going to the offensive glass), we can box one or two out, and certainly we have to do better boxing out, but they're just so long that it's tough to keep them off the glass."

Ypsilanti coach Steve Brooks said the Phoenix made a more concerted effort to pound the ball inside after halftime.

"We just wanted to get it inside and try to get it off the glass and use our length that way," Brooks said.

Still missing Derrick Richardson with a back injury, Ypsilanti had others pick up the scoring load, with four players finishing in double figures. Ba had 14 points, Tristan Simmons scored 12, Darryl Tipton 11 and Davis 10.

Luke Hollandsworth scored 16 and Jack McDougall 13 for Chelsea, which led 15-11 after the first quarter but faded, getting outscored 17-5 in the second quarter and managing one field goal in the quarter.

"Good first quarter, got off to a great start," Raymond said. "Then I think in the second quarter it kind of looked like we were a little tired."

Part of the reason for that is the Bulldogs were down to eight healthy bodies after Logan Brown rolled his ankle in the second quarter.

After Ypsilanti scored the first three points of the second half, Chelsea got no closer than nine, although twice in the fourth quarter it had good looks at 3-pointers that would've cut the deficit to six.

"We have nothing to be ashamed of," Raymond said. "Ypsi's certainly a very good team and we held our own."

Contact Jason Idalski at jasonidalski@annarbor.com.