CoachJohn Ralls’ 2A Central Carolina Conference favorites dominated the second half and defeated North’s Cavaliers 63-52 at the North gym.

Coach Gary Atwell’s North girls, champions of the Sam Moir Christmas Classic last week, were riding a six-game winning streak into the CCC matchup.

Led by forwards Megan Honeycutt and LaTasha Pharr, North led by six late in the first period at 15-9 and by four late in the second quarter at 24-20.

But the Panthers (2-0 in the CCC, 13-0 overall) scored the last five points of the first half for a 25-24 lead at intermission. Ledford then made three 3-pointers in the first 2:35 of the second half to extend their run to 16-0. It was 36-24 after Pam Oast’s second straight 3, and North never got closer than eight after that.

“I knew 15 (Oast) could shoot. We had talked about trying to keep a hand in Oast’s face,” said Atwell. “But when 45 (post player Lindsay Smith) swung out there and hit a 3, that kind of surprised me.”

Smith led the Panthers’ balanced scoring with 13 points, including nine in the second quarter before fouling out with 4:58 left in the game. Leslie Hinkle added 12 points, including 10-for-12 at the foul line in the fourth quarter. Oast made three 3s and finished with 11 points.

Honeycutt, matching her season high of 24 points, tried to keep the Cavaliers (1-1, 8-3) in the contest. She also had nine rebounds, two steals, two blocked shots and an assist. Pharr had 10 points, five rebounds, a blocked shot and an assist.

“They made a run on us, and we never recovered from that,” said Atwell.

Ledford got most of its first-half points in close from post players Casie Thomas, Smith and Hinson, but came out firing from outside in the second half. The Panthers moved the ball around against North’s 2-3 zone and found gaps for outside shots.

“They had a pretty good open look because we didn’t get there to it,” said Atwell. “Whereas, in the first half we were getting there to it. It looked like we came out a step slow at the beginning of the third quarter, and they made the shots.”

The North coach is impressed with Ledford, a perennial 2A power.

“They’re a good basketball team. They play hard; they play physical. They do a heck of a job on the backboards,” he said.

Ledford had a 34-24 rebound advantage with Thomas grabbing eight and Hinson and Kara Mendenhall seven apiece.

“They’re just so sound underneath, and they box out like crazy,” said Atwell. “I thought we were doing a pretty good job, but we just don’t have the height to play with them underneath like that.”

He still thinks his Cavaliers can play with Ledford when the teams meet again.

“We’ve got to play just as physical as they play. That’s what we talked about after the game. And we’ve got to execute better in our man-to-man offense. We didn’t do a very good job of running our man-to-man offense at times. We would take the ball in too deep on the baseline and get double-teamed,” he said.

“We also need to be able to press them the whole game. We didn’t give up many baskets off our (zone) press, but I just thought we ran out of steam trying to press. We were just trying to wear them out.I figured it may have wore us out before it wore them out. They’re real deep. They play nine to 10 girls in their basic rotation, and we play seven or eight,” Atwell added.

North also had trouble protecting the basketball in the second half. The Cavaliers made only nine turnovers in the entire first half, then eight in the third quarter, most of them in the first four minutes.

“We got down in a hurry, and we started pressing too much on offense. We got a little sloppy,” said Atwell, whose Cavaliers ended up with 21 turnovers.

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NOTES: North had the edge in field goal shooting, going 21-for-49 (42.9 percent) to Ledford’s 20-for-52 (38.5 percent). Ledford outshot the Cavaliers at the foul line, making 18 of 28 to North’s nine of 17. ... The Cavaliers visit North Stanly in the CCC on Friday.

LEDFORD (63) — Oast 11, Mendenhall 9, Hinson 4, Hinkle 12, Smith 13, Ralls 4, Thomas 10, Ferrell, Krull.

NORTH ROWAN (52) — Honeycutt 24, C. Hill 6, Pharr 10, Hipps 2, Tucker 2, A. Hill 7, Witherspoon 1, Bowie.

Ledford 11 14 19 19 — 63