CHARLOTTE — Thanks to one of those rare three-game weeks the Falcons find themselves in, forgetting what happened Tuesday night at Harding should be relatively easy.
West Rowan’s girls basketball team scored 16 points in the first quarter and 22 the rest of the night before finishing off winless Harding by a final of 38-25.
The Falcons’ win proved a stark contrast to the first meeting between the 3A South Piedmont Conference rivals. West walloped Harding 54-20 to open the league season.
“When we played them the first time, the score was much more our way than theirs andI don’t feel like we had the intensity we should have had tonight,”Falcons head coach Angie Waddell said. “We didn’t play West Rowan basketball.”
TheFalcons (9-6 overall, 6-2 SPC) shot 12-for-48 from the field (25 percent) and 14-for-31 from the free-throw line (45 percent). Twenty turnovers added to the fun.
“It was pretty ugly,”guard Jenny Sloop said. “It wasn’t anything like we’re used to playing.
“I don’t want to say we took it for granted, but we didn’t play to our potential. We were lazy.”
Part of the problem was a make-shift lineup. Sara Pieper was in street clothes, out sick, and guards Hillary Hampton and Kristen McNeely were limited by the same illness.
“Two more games this week — we’ll need lots of orange juice and chicken noodle,”Waddell joked.
Hampton still led a first-quarter defense that forced nine turnovers and led to easy chances. The freshman guard had two steals off the press and scored six points to stake West to a 16-8 lead, but Ram Jeannie Sanders had four points in the final minute to narrow the lead to 16-12.
The Falcons, after missing six free throws in the first quarter, couldn’t pull away in the second thanks to seven misses from the charity stripe. With whistles blowing constantly, three Rams ended the half with three fouls and the game crawled toward intermission.
West got two field goals in the second quarter, one each from Hampton and Shameeka Wansley. Harding went 1-for-16. The teams combined for 13 points as the Falcons led 24-17.
“We talked about them getting a lot of second shots, too many easy opportunities, us making bad decisions with the ball,”Waddell said. “Even with the girls we had out, that’s something a coach doesn’t like to see. You don’t care who it is.”
Harding actually closed within 24-21 to start the third quarter before Hampton and the full-court press took over. TheFalcons launched a 7-0 run to finish the quarter, getting three steals and two layups from Hampton and two scores from Sloop and Ashley Dowdy.
The Rams went 7:42 without a field goal in the fourth quarter — from Sanders’ jumper in the opening seconds to Natalie Hess’ score with 3 seconds remaining. In between, West only scored five points on a Danielle Scearce putback and Wansley’s bucket in the lane.
Sloop’s free throw — one of three West hit in the quarter — closed the scoring, got the Falcons off the court and thinking about tonight’s game against Piedmont and Friday night’s battle at East Rowan.
“A win is a win and go on to the next one,”Waddell said.
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Notes: Adding to the misery Tuesday night was some interesting officiating. “There were 25 fouls called in the first half and less than 10 in the second half,”Waddell said. “That makes you a little ill and irate at times, but you have to get through that mentally.” Her girls shared some incredulous looks at times, but indeed managed to play through it. … Harding’s numbers were even worse than West’s — 9-for-42 from the field (21 percent) and 28 turnovers.
WEST ROWAN (38) — Sloop 6, Moore 4, Hampton 13, Scearce 4, Wansley 8, Dowdy 2, Jones 1, McNeely, Peebles, Izze, Massey.
HARDING (25) — Hess 3, Sanders 9, Alexander, Murray, Oliver 8, Buckley 1, Nash 4.
West Rowan 16 8 9 5 — 38
Harding 12 5 4 4 — 25
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