Submitted photo – The Orleans girls celebrate their recent tournament win at Freshwater.

By Ray Hamill — The Orleans community has reason to feel proud.

After not fielding a team in several years, Orleans Elementary School returned to competition in girls basketball this year and boy did they impress.

The young players closed out their season this past weekend with a record of 15-3, which included winning the recent Freshwater tournament.

And they did it with a small squad of mostly sixth and seventh graders, while matching up against teams of mostly eighth graders.

“The community is just so proud of them,” head coach Chook-Chook Hillman said.

The team defense set the tone all season long, which was a goal the coaches set the players at the start, and they outscored their opponents by a combined 719 to 312 over their 18 games.

And they should only continue to get better.

The team’s biggest three contributors — sixth grader BellaAnn King and seventh graders Vuunsip E-Kor and Luella Cosce — should all be back in 2024, with just two eight graders moving on after this year.

“It was a really good year for us and next year we’ll be even better,” Hillman said.

King was hugely influential in the success and led the team’s defensive hustle with 100 steals in the 18 games, while also scoring 132 points and pulling down 78 rebounds.

The young standout also finished with a team-high 51 assists.

E-Kor, who is fondly known as Woonie, was equally effective and finished with a team-high 208 points, an average of 11.5 a game, as well as 89 rebounds.

So too was Cosce, who had a team-best 92 boards, as well as 79 steals and 164 points.

“We call them our big three and they’ll all be back next year,” Hillman said. “They really put up gaudy numbers.”

They weren’t the only players to have a big impact on the team’s success.

Eighth grader Cherish McCovey scored 97 points and had a team-high 11 blocks, while sixth grader Evalina Robbins added 57 points and 28 steals and seventh grader Maple Myers was a force on the boards and finished the season with 91 rebounds, just one off the team high.

Asked what he liked most about this team, Hillman replied “Their defensive intensity.”

It was something the coaches stressed to their players at the start of the season, and the young girls did not disappoint.

“Even when our shots weren’t falling, the defense was on it,” he said. 

Eight grader Violet King, seventh grader Aurellia Boadicea and sixth grader Onjalee Harrison rounded out this impressive roster and each also played some valuable minutes and key roles in the team’s success.

And, according to assistant coach Bubba King, it was the team’s collective attitude that paved the way to success.

“They have a tireless work ethic and a never quit attitude,” he said.

Hillman echoed the sentiment.

“At the beginning of the year we kind of stressed that as long as our defense is tough we’re going to do really well,” the head coach said. “And they really came through and they never took plays off on defense.”

And that’s not all the coaches appreciated about their players.

“They’re really sweet girls,” Hillman added.