SPRINGFIELD — When Belchertown’s Laura Sotiropoulos bounced the game’s first goal into the net only 30 seconds in, it signified the potential for a barnburner. Yet, the Orioles ended up in a grind of a game with Pope Francis, where scoring became scarce. The Belchertown defense was able to step up greatly, as they held the Cardinals to four goals in a 10-4 victory Thursday.

“[Our defense] has been something we’ve focused on all week, so I think that they really brought it through in the game today,” Belchertown coach Chelsea Davis said. “It was fantastic. I haven’t seen them crash like that in any game yet, and ultimately it helped us win the game. I think they didn’t get enough shots off due to the crashing of our defense.”

Any threatening Pope Francis player was swallowed up before she could get an open shot, and if a shot was attempted, goalie Mabelle Bessette was likely to deny it.

“I think Mabelle, our goalie, had a fantastic game,” Davis said. “She really helped us down on the defensive end.”

Following the opening goal of the game, Bessette snatched a stick save on the other end soon after. After a couple more defensive stops, the ball was being carried by Maddy LePage. She ran with the ball for more than half the distance of the field, and zipped through the Cardinals’ defense before scoring to make it 2-0.

After a Pope Francis score, Belchertown responded with a Paige Magner goal. The final score of the half came from Sam Pacunas, who ran across the goalie from the goalie’s right side, then turned around and fired it into the net.

The Orioles had an easier time scoring initially in the second half, as they rattled off three goals in the period’s first nine minutes. The Cardinals had only scored one goal during Belchertown’s offensive surge, so the Orioles had a 7-2 lead while playing some of the best defense they had played all year.

The game stayed mostly quiet for the rest of the competition until Pacunas scored three late goals to put Belchertown at double digits in the scoring column.

With plenty more games on the schedule, the team looks to fine-tune some more aspects of its game.

“I think [what we’ll be working on] is possession,” Davis said. “We have a fantastic attack, so I think just getting them in a set ability to run plays is going to be big for us.”