Nazareth and Parkland have now had two impressive battles on the court this season in girls basketball. It was almost two weeks ago when Nazareth beat the Lady Trojans 31-28 in Nazareth.

Tuesday night, the two teams met at Parkland and again, the Lady Blue Eagles came out on top with a 41-38 win.

In the first meeting, Tessa Brugler scored 20 points and she upped her game in the most recent meeting, dropping in a game-high 25 points, 11 of which came in the fourth quarter.

Parkland was down 20-14 at the half, but chipped away, narrowing the deficit to three going into the final quarter. Brugler’s big finale was able to hold off Parkland, who fell to 10-3 in the EPC and 13-4 overall with the loss.

For Parkland, Julia Buchman hit four three-pointers and finished with 18 points, while Emily Piston finished with 12 points in the loss.

“They’re a very good team,” said Trojan head coach Wes Spence. “The effort was there on our side, we just couldn’t stop Tessa late in the game, and she has the ability to just take over a game.”

The loss dropped Parkland just behind Northampton (11-3, 14-5) for second place in the Eastern Pennsylvania Conference Skyline Division. The Trojans and Konkrete Kids meet at Northampton in the season finale next Wednesday. Meanwhile, Nazareth (12-1, 17-2) leads the division. As things stand now, Parkland would be the fifth-seed going into the EPC playoffs, which are scheduled to start on February 10.

Before the finale against Northampton, Parkland plays Whitehall (4-9, 6-13) and Dieruff (1-13, 1-17) in the EPC and has a nonconference game at Cumberland Valley.

“You can never tell against any of these teams, especially this season,” said Spence. “There are a lot of teams that are capable of putting together a good game and can beat you, so you have to go out every night playing hard.”

Coming into the meeting with Nazareth, Parkland had won eight of its last nine games, with the only setback being the earlier loss to Nazareth. Despite the latest loss, Spence is happy with how his team has played.

“I told the girls that I’m happy with their effort,” he said. “We’ve been playing very well lately and I really can’t fault our girls for anything, because they’re working hard and playing very well, so I’m not too concerned about this loss.”

With two losses to Nazareth and an early season loss to Bethlehem Catholic, Spence isn’t concerned about having to meet tougher teams, or having to play either of those top teams again come playoff time.

“We don’t have any fear facing anybody,” he said. “We have respect for teams and we know that there are teams out there that are very tough to beat, but we always just go into a game looking to do what we have to do to win.

“That game against Beca was very early in the season and I think we’re a much better team since then, so we’ll be ready to play whoever we have to play.”