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MOUNTULLA — West Rowan’s girls basketball team may have been missing assistant coach Toni Wheeler on Tuesday night, but that was all it was missing. The Falcons missed few open shots in an easy 65-40 win over South Rowan.
Wheeler, starting the holidays early, was out of town, but that didn’t stop the Falcons from connecting often from downtown against the school Wheeler once starred for.
Especially hot was forward Sara Pieper, who made five straight first-half jumpers over South’s surprise zone defense. Pieper had 15 of her team-high 19 points by halftime and the Falcons (2-0) had the nonconference contest on ice at 36-14 by the time they exited the floor for intermission.
“This was fun,” said Pieper. “Like I said, we’re going to win some ballgames.”
West led just 8-6 after South’s Mandy Yost hit a 3-pointer from the corner with two minutes left in the first quarter. But then the Falcons got their running game in gear. West closed the first half on a 14-2 tear fueled by guard Kristen McNeely’s defensive pressure. McNeely had five steals and five assists in the second quarter, as Pieper, Jenny Sloop and freshman Hillary Hampton, who shot an impressive 7-for-10 for 14 points, finished the plays off.
“Our start was pretty bad tonight,” said McNeely, a 5-foot-6 Energizer bunny who has 15 steals in West’s first two games. “But we’ve worked hard in practice. We’re better now than we were in our first game. Definitely.”
Head coach Angie Waddell agreed.
“Once we settled in out there I was pleased,” she said. “We put a lot of pressure on their guards and that really helped us out.”
With South committing 24 first-half turnovers, the Raiders (0-3) had a tough time getting the ball down the floor and into the hands of 6-1 Brittney Gaddy. And the Raiders had more turnover troubles in the second half. West’s lead ballooned to as many as 31 points at 49-18 after Hampton came up with a loose ball and hit Pieper for a finger-roll layup with 2:14 to go in the third quarter.
“The way we came out and played so hard in the third quarter was good to see,” said Waddell. “The way the score was at the half, we could have easily come out flat. We didn’t.”
One reason, West’s starters can’t afford to go on cruise control is that there are more good players pushing them for playing time from the bench. Allison Moore, a 5-6 junior lefty who backs up Hampton and McNeely, proved that in the second half by going 4-for-4 from the field and converting a driving 3-point play.
“Allison is a good passer and has some real speed,” said Waddell of the track star. “She’ll get the ball and she’s gone. And when she’s gone, I mean, she’s really gone.”
“You do your best whenever you get a chance to get out there,” said Moore. “Everybody on this team knows how to play.”
And everybody on the West team knows that Gaddy is a handful. Gaddy scored 21 points — 15 in the second half — and has scored at least half of the Raiders’ points in every game so far. She added 16 rebounds and six blocked shots, two of them on attempts by Pieper in the lane.
The good news for South coach James Greene is that it looks like Gaddy is going to get some serious help on the blocks from youngster Alexis Blackwood, who opened the season on the jayvees. Blackwood, a 6-footer, scored eight points and yanked down 11 rebounds. Led by its twin towers, South actually outrebounded West 44-32, which should give Green reason for optimism and Waddell, who played a small lineup most of the night, reason for concern.
“It was like every rebound went to their big girls and they scored or got to the line,” said Waddell. “We were so worried about Gaddy. All night I was asking, ‘How many fouls does she have?’”
But Gaddy avoided serious foul trouble. She and Blackwood combined for all of South’s points in the fourth quarter as the Raiders outscored West 16-14.
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NOTES:West shot 14-for-18 from the foul line. ... West made just one turnover in its sharp third quarter. ... Pieper’s 19 was her second highest point total at West. ... West has won the last four meetings in the series. ... West grad Kate Goodman, who’s now playing at Guilford, sat on the Falcon bench. ... Former Falcon standout Kari Schenk was also in the house. West’s game with North, scheduled for Nov. 28, has been postponed.
SOUTHROWAN (40) — Gaddy 21, Blackwood 8, Willett 4, Yost 3, Raper 2, Miller 2, Brown, Culbertson, Khan, Littlejohn, Efird, Neely, Rice.
WESTROWAN (65) — Pieper 19, Hampton 14, Moore 9, McNeely 8, Scearce 6, Sloop 4, Dowdy 3, Wansley 2, Jones, Massey, Izze, Peebles.
South Rowan 6 8 10 16 — 40 West Rowan 16 20 15 14 — 65
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