North Medford found itself in seemingly perfect position in the early going of its Southwest Conference girls basketball opener Tuesday night at home against Grants Pass.

The Black Tornado built a 13-2 lead midway through the first quarter, and carried a 29-14 lead into the break against the visiting Cavers.

In a complete turnabout in play, however, North Medford saw the script flipped in the second half to endure a 43-29 loss to Grants Pass.

Olivia Boger had 11 points and four assists for the Black Tornado (4-8, 0-1 SWC), while Caileigh Raines produced six points, 12 rebounds and six blocks.

The Cavers (8-5, 1-0) trailed throughout the first half and couldn’t find their footing until the second half, when they employed a full-court press which threw a wrench into North Medford’s plans.

“We just need to pull through 32 minutes of good basketball,” said Boger. “Not just eight or 16 minutes, it’s like every game now.”

After a fine first-half showing, North Medford had a scoreless third quarter and committed 17 turnovers in the second half as Grants Pass pressed hard to force lobbed and telegraphed passes.

“We started to bicker with each other a little bit,” said Boger. “We were all just worried about losing our lead and we kind of snapped at each other instead of trying to beat the other team.”

North Medford allowed 22 straight points by the Cavers, finally broken up when Boger scored a transition layup with 3:22 left in the game.

Black Tornado coach JT Thomas saw his team deviate from its game plan as the focus switched to the team’s dwindling lead.

“We keep telling our kids at the highest level, you’ve got to depend on your scheme,” Thomas said about the second half. “They’ve gotta depend on their fundamentals in the tough times, and in the second half was when we lost our grip on the bat.”

In the first half, North Medford controlled the flow with half-court sets as Sophia West had two 3-pointers and Raines made life difficult at the rim for Grants Pass.

Raines helped stifle Brooklyn Wakefield in a first half that saw the Cavers miss several point-blank shots at the rim. Wakefield went on to finish with a double-double of 10 points and 10 rebounds.

The Black Tornado were not only unable to set up on offense in the second half, but Raines defensively was not able to get in position to deter easy shots as she managed in the opening 16 minutes.

“She has a really innate understanding of timing,” Thomas said about Raines’ defensive impact. “She’s putting herself in the right positions with her body and it’s just been impressive to see her make those adjustments in games to what the other team is doing. ”

After Boger’s drought-breaking basket, the Black Tornado began to break the press by finding Raines, who was the outlet pass in the middle.

“I feel like we just folded,” said Raines. “We fell under the pressure after they picked it up a little bit, but after a little bit, I feel like we picked it up, too.”

“We just were a little bit too late after their aggression picked up,” she added.

Responding to a big scoring run is a part of winning that Thomas wants North Medford to learn.

“We are just continually going through these moments of what you have to go through to learn how hard winning is,” Thomas said. “We talked about that and we will be OK.”

“This is a healthy group of competitive girls and they certainly don’t like the outcome,” he added.