MOUNT ULLA — West Rowan, the hottest girls basketball team in the 3A
SouthPiedmont Conference, stayed hot Monday night.
Coach Angie Waddell’s second-seeded Falcons
coasted past No. 7 Sun Valley 64-26 in a first-round SPC Tournament contest.
West (17-7), riding a seven-game winning streak,
will now face Northwest Cabarrus (20-3) in a game that could determine the SPC’s
No. 2 seed for the state 3A playoffs. West meets Northwest at 7:45 p.m.
Wednesday in the semifinals at A.L. Brown’s Bullock Gymnasium.
Northwest beat Piedmont 59-53 in its tournament
opener last night.
West and Northwest shared second place in the SPC
standings with 13-3 records, and West got the No. 2 seed for the league
tournament by virtue of a win over No. 1 Central Cabarrus on Friday night.
The league’s No. 2 seed for the state playoffs,
however, will be determined in this week’s tournament. If any team other than
Central Cabarrus wins the tourney, it gets the No. 2 seed. If Central wins the
championship, Wednesday’s West-Northwest contest would determine the No. 2
spot, which is important, since that team will draw a first-round bye next week.
The No. 3, 4 and 5 seeds also will qualify for the playoffs.
The Falcons lost to Northwest 47-35 in December,
when starting center Shameeka Wansley went out with a shoulder injury early in
the game. The Falcons came back to beat the Trojans 58-55 on Jan. 23.
“We’re going to play them just like we play
anybody else, regardless of who they are and who they have,” said Waddell. “We’re
just going to go out there and play our game and not worry about that opponent.
We’re just going to do everything right and let the chips fall where they may.
Northwest plays a physical brand of basketball, but
Waddell says her team can be physical too.
“I hope that we’ll come out physical. They’re
scrappy, but we’ll come out and scrap too,” she said.
West dominated Sun Valley (4-19) from the beginning
last night, surging to a 13-0 lead early in the game, then going on another 17-0
run that extended into the second quarter.
West’s lead was 21-2 after one quarter and 30-2
before Sun Valley hit its second basket of the night. It was 39-10 at halftime.
The big early lead enabled Waddell to play all her
players a lot of minutes and allowed the West starters to stay rested for the
semifinals and possibly Friday’s championship game.
“When you play like three games a week late in the
season, you want to keep their legs fresh. We tried to do a lot of rotation and
tried to get everybody in the game,” said Waddell.
Reserve Allison Moore led West’s balanced scoring
with 10 points, which included 3-for-3 field goal shooting in the final quarter.
McNeely and freshman reserve Ashley Dowdy added nine and eight points,
respectively.
“We did a lot of good things. I wanted us to keep
pushing the ball and, if the middle’s open, I wanted us to attack that middle.
And if we had the outside shot, I wanted us to take the shot,” said Waddell.
The Falcons scored their share of transition layups
off steals and got some outside shooting that included two 3s by McNeely and one
3 by Dowdy. West went 26-for-49 on field goals for an impressive 53.1 percent.
n
NOTES: Reserve Natalie Jones led West in rebounds
with five as the Falcons beat Sun Valley 35-22 on the boards. ... Sara Pieper’s
three assists, two steals, two points, a rebound and a blocked shot in the first
quarter helped West get off to a fast start. She led the Falcons with five
assists. ... Dowdy and McNeely had four and three steals, respectively. ... West
had 33 turnovers to the Spartans’ 32. ... Sun Valley was only 11-for-52 (21.2
percent) from the floor. No Spartan scored over four points.
SUN VALLEY (26)— Burch 2, Blanchard 4, Cooke 3, McWhorter 1, Osborn 4, Hemby 3, Barrino 4, Speller, Brantley 3, Guyton, Jenkins 2.
WEST ROWAN (64) — Scearce 6, Pieper 2, Wansley 6, McNeely 9, Hampton 6, Sloop 4, Jones 3, Moore 10, Dowdy 8, Massey 6, Izze 2, Peebles 2.
Sun Valley 2 8 6 19 — 26
West Rowan 21 18 12 13 — 64
Today's News