It started out different than it ended.

With the Lady Orioles opening their season against Elk Mound Tuesday November 16 at Stanley-Boyd, the early game saw a neck and neck competition, before a few failed scoring attempts and Elk Mound dance around Oriole defenses saw the Mounders pull away in scoring for a 64-49 finish against Stanley- Boyd. Starting out for the Orioles Tuesday night were Leslie Derks, Tina Benson, Kayte Licht, Mallory Eslinger, and Lily Hoel.

Starting out for the Elk Mound Mounders were Brooklynne Emery, Ellie Schizzik, Madisymn Mohr, Olivia Schreiber, and Stella Rhude.

Following tipoff the ball was in Elk Mound’s hands, being held outside the three-point line of the Oriole’s basket with an attempted basket caught on rebound by Licht for the Orioles.

Licht took the ball downcourt passing it to Eslinger, who passed it off to Jessica Hazuga, thence to Derks.

Derks passed the ball to Licht who gave it to Eslinger, back to Derks, and on to Hoel, who went in for the basket before getting the whistle blow.

The ball turned over to Elk Mound, who took it back down court into Oriole territory.

With a few more whistle blows intervening the first basket made was a three pointer by Elk Mound’s Schreiber, a second three-point attempt caught on the rebound by the Orioles Lliy Hoel, who passed it off to Mallory Eslinger before the timeout whistle was blown.

Following the return of game action the ball was passed in court by Eslinger to Derks, who passed it to Licht and thence to Hazuga, followed with a pass steal by Elk Mound’s Lydia Levra. With two points made by Elk Mound in the interim the Orioles nonetheless managed to hold off Elk Mound for a while until another three-point attempt by Emery was followed by back and forth, ending with a successful three-pointer by Elk Mound’s Tori Blaskowski, giving Elk Mound the lead —but things weren’t over yet.

Down by eight points early on, the Orioles came back, starting with a two-pointer by Hoel following passing action from Derks, to Licht, to Eslinger, to Hoel.

Following upon a failed three pointer by Elk Mound, Hoel made another two point basket for the Orioles, with two good free throws by Tina Benson and a layup by Hazuga bringing things even 8-8. With Stanley-Boyd pulling ahead 10-8 with a two-pointer by Hoel, a rebound downcourt and the whistle followed with a free throw and a layup led to Elk Mound starting to pull away. With Elk Mound sticking to the outside and passing around the Orioles defense, before long the score had turned to 15-10 in Elk Mound’s favor. At the half it stood 31-20, and didn’t change in the second.

As to overall game points, the majority came from Lily Hoel and Leslie Derks, with Hoel scoring four two-pointers and two free throws in the first half, along with another four two-pointers and two free throws in the second, for a total of 16 game points.

For Derks, three free throw attempts in the first half were joined by three two-pointers and three successful free throws in the second half, for a total of nine game points. Moving down the scoring roster Benson came in with five points (two free throws and one three-pointer), Licht scored a two-pointer, Eslinger scored two three-pointers and one free throw, while Hazuga saw two two-pointers and Emme Felmlee had two free throws to add.

The Lady Orioles play Rhinelander next at DC Everest, on Friday November 26 at 2:00 p.m.