By Bill Kiser

Salisbury Post

MOORESVILLE — After seeing his team struggle through the first half of Friday’s game against Mooresville, South Rowan girls coach Jim Brooks had a few choice words for his players.

They weren’t the kind of words that can be printed in your local newspaper, but the message got through to the Raiders, who turned up the heat in the second half to beat the winless Blue Devils 46-17.

Taylor May scored 14 of her game-high 18 points in the final two quarters for South Rowan (4-2), which also had seven other players score two or more points in the non-conference game.

“Sometimes you start off sloppy, and we did,” Brooks said after the Raiders’ second consecutive win. “But they came out and got their heads in (the game). … This bunch is able to respond to situations.”

And South faced plenty of situations in the first half as it struggled to find a rhythm and shooting touch. The Raiders shot just 28 percent from the field in the half and only managed to lead at the end of each quarter thanks to some last-minute shotmaking.

Mooresville (0-4) led until the final second of the first quarter when Kristen Brown nailed a 30-footer at the buzzer to put South up 9-8.

The Blue Devils were up again with less than a minute to go in the second quarter before Kim Wilson’s 3-pointer and Katherine Van Wieren’s layup gave the Raiders a 16-13 halftime lead.

The only reason Mooresville couldn’t take advantage of South Rowan’s shooting problems was because it had its own troubles, shooting 23.8 percent from the field in the half.

“We didn’t run our offense the way we do most of the time, and we didn’t get many open shots,” May said.

That prompted Brooks’ little halftime conversation with his players.

“There were a few (four-letter words),” May said. “He said we shouldn’t get outrebounded by a team that was so short and that we needed to pick ourselves up.”

“You can’t print what I told them,” Brooks said, laughing. “Naw, I just wanted them to get out there and play hard and not worry about messing up. I told them to go out and do what we had practiced.

The Raiders did — they shot nearly 50 percent from the field in the second half, forced 18 turnovers and held the Blue Devils without a field goal until late in the fourth quarter.

“I got on them like any coach would,” Brooks said. “We played better defensively. We got more active, and when that happened (Mooresville) got frustrated. That carried over offensively for us.”

South Rowan outscored the Blue Devils 16-1 in the third quarter and went ahead 40-14 before Alexa Martin hit a jumper with 2:37 left in the fourth.

A 6-0 run put the Raiders ahead 46-16 with 1:39 left and gave them their biggest lead of the game.

south ROWAN (46) — May 18, Wilson 8, Brown 5, Morton 5, Van Wieren 4, Haywood 2, Garrett 2, Wise 2, Houston.

Mooresville (17) — Martin 9, Powell 3, Butner 3, Harris 2, Delaughter, Stockton, Howard, Sullivan, Sturdivant, Turner.

S. Rowan 9 7 16 14 — 46

Mooresville 8 5 1 3 — 17

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Contact Bill Kiser at sports@salisburypost.com.