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WALLBURG — You can’t blame Salisbury’s girls basketball coach Jennifer Shoaf for cringing each time her team takes the court against Ledford or High Point Central.
Her players react the same way each time — in awe.
Take Friday night’s 79-25 loss to the Panthers.
“We never got set on offense. We turned the ball over too much. We didn’t know where to go on defense,” Shoaf said. “It’s just simple things that we do right in practice and we do right against other teams. But they’re so worried about the reputation of these two schools that they don’t relax.”
It was difficult to relax against John Ralls’ Panthers (14-1, 3-1). They pressured the ball. They stole the ball. And then, they put the ball in the basket with relative ease.
Time after monotonous time.
In fact, it was nothing more than a Ledford layup drill throughout a first half that had Ledford up 42-13. Out of 20 Ledford buckets, 16 were layups.
“Obviously, we shot the ball pretty well,” said Ralls, the sixth winningest active coach in North Carolina (434-151). “We were looking to do things that we’ll need to do later on.”
For Shoaf, the misery continued against the top two clubs in the Central Carolina Conference. As far as she’s concerned, Ledford and High Point Central are practically even.
Central beat Salisbury by 53 (84-31) and Ledford won by 54.
Salisbury’s biggest problem is finding somebody to help out seniors Ke-Ke Chunn and Ternisha Charleston. They scored 24 of the Hornets’ 25.
“I talked to my other eight players and told them they have to be a supporting cast,” Shoaf said.“But it’s like sometimes, we’re talking in a foreign language. That’s what I feel like. Ihold up five fingers and they’re counting them.”
The subs even had Shoaf shaking her head when Charleston went down with a sprained ankle with 4:47 left in the first period. At the time, the score was Ledford 6, Chunn 4. But without her ballhandling, Ledford quickly spurted to a 21-5 first quarter lead.
“It was our own two girls who hurt Ternisha,” marveled Shoaf. “But she’s tough. She looked at us and said, ‘I can’t leave Ke-Ke out there by herself.’ ”
A two-person team wasn’t much better than a one-person club. Ledford was simply too strong, pounding the ball inside to Lindsey Smith and Alicia Stokes. When they weren’t scoring down low, Katie Ralls and Leslie Hinkle were drilling short jumpers.
Salisbury came out of the locker room pumped up — at least Chunn did. The talented guard scored two of the quarter’s first three baskets. And by the end of the quarter — you guessed it — Chunn was the only Hornet able to score. She had all eight, her last two coming on a pretty runner. But Ledford led 62-19 going into the final eight minutes.
Chunn finished with 17.
“She’s a good player,” praised Ralls. “We had a lot of trouble with her. We didn’t contain her. On the other hand, she gets to shoot on almost every possession. So she puts up good numbers.”
If the first three periods were tough for Shoaf to digest, she should’ve closed her eyes when the fourth began. Ledford, playing with mostly subs, ripped off the first 11 points for a 73-21 lead. Of the five baskets, none were over 10 feet.
By game’s end, Ralls was especially happy. He saw 10 Panthers had made it into the scoring column and the thorough thrashing at the hands of High Point Central earlier in the week had been forgotten.
“I think they handled it well — the way I would want them to handle it,” he said. “We played with a little bit of an attitude, a little bit of an edge. This might be the first night in a while we’ve played all 12 people.”
While Ledford has gotten over the effects of playing the Bison, Salisbury still searches a way to get over the mental hump against these two juggernauts.
While Shoaf talked in the postgame, she munched on a hamburger and fries in the lobby, surrounded by giant photos of state title teams in several sports.
“I know it’s intimidating,” she said. “You come in here and see all of these state championship (banners) everywhere. You go to High Point and all you hear is how they’re going to win it all. That’s tough when you’re dealing with 14, 15, 16-year old minds.”
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NOTES: Salisbury fell to 6-7, 1-3. ... Jenny Reilly did not play due to a bum left knee. ... Ledford put four in double figures. ... Charleston scored five and Patricia Wilson had one. ... Salisbury will look to bounce back at home Tuesday against North Stanly (0-5, 5-9).
SALISBURY (25) — Chunn 17, Charleston 7, Wilson 1, Abel, Doby, Jones, Wingerson, Seay..
LEDFORD (79) — Hinkle 18, Smith 17, Stokes 13, Ralls 11, Krull 6, McCarthy 4, Pietsch 4, Lee 2, Davis 2, Fitzgerald 2.
Salisbury 5 8 6 6 — 25
Ledford 21 21 20 17 — 79
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