By Mike London

Salisbury Post

South Rowan’s girls shot

7-for-18 from the foul line, committed 28 turnovers and missed a dozen layups on Wednesday afternoon.

The fourth-seeded Raiders were their own worst enemy in a 45-39 loss to Davie County in the first round of the RoMedical Care Sam Moir Christmas Classic, so it would be silly to blame everything that went wrong on one unfriendly whistle.

Still, that one whistle was absolutely humongous.

Fifth-seeded Davie got the call on a block-or-charge collision near midcourt with 1:08 remaining and the War Eagles clinging to 40-39 lead.

When Davie guard Tonesha Turner and South’s Kristen Brown crashed like bumper cars at the county fair, Brown, lying flat on her back, was assessed her fifth foul.

South coach Jim Brooks smashed a fist into his padded chair reacting to the call and was hit with a technical foul.

“Just a Gary Williams meltdown, I guess,” Brooks said. “But I’ve done and said worse without getting a technical.”

Davie’s Meisha Fowler hit one of two technical free throws. Then Fowler stayed at the line — officials must have gotten No. 15 Fowler confused with No. 5 Turner — and went 1-for-2 on the free throws awarded for the personal foul for a 42-39 lead.

South still got the ball back with a chance to tie with a 3-pointer, but the flustered Raiders couldn’t connect.

Fowler then made two more free throws and Kellie Brown one to finish the scoring.

Fowler, who led Davie (5-7) with 17 points, dribbled away the final 10 seconds, as the Raiders (5-6) stared at her in numb disbelief.

“That was just hard,” said sophomore Taylor May, who led South with 12 points. “It’s hard to put that much emotion into a game and not win it.”

Davie, which beat South by 10 points in a CPC game in Landis, was all over the Raiders early and bolted to an 11-2 lead.

But the Raiders climbed out of that deep hole when Davie’s shooting turned cold. The War Eagles needed a banked 3-pointer by Turner for a 21-18 halftime lead.

“They took the first blow and kept crashing the boards so we couldn’t pull away,” Davie coach Debbie Evans said. “I’m glad our girls kept their composure as much as they did.”

South finally grabbed its first lead when Katherine Van Wieren (eight points, 11 rebounds) backed her defender down from the 3-point line to the baseline and made a layup for a 35-34 lead with 4:57 remaining.

But 16 seconds later, Morgan Owens scored on stickback — her only points — to put the War Eagles on top to stay.

“We got after it and played as a team,” said Kellie Brown, who hit a big Davie 3-pointer to start the fourth quarter. “And we made a lot more free throws than we usually do.”

May drilled a jump shot with 1:13 left to play to bring South within 40-39, but that huge whistle followed as Turner was trying to bring the ball up the floor against Kristen Brown.

“We played our hearts out, and I’ve go no beef with that,” Brooks said. “But we let a separate element other than us decide our fate. We let it get out of the hands of South Rowan, and when you do that, you’re in trouble.”

DAVIE COUNTY (45) — Fowler 17, Turner 9, Ke. Brown 5, Evans 5, Walker 4, J. Garrett 3, Owens 2, Riddle, Parrish, Wharton.

SOUTH ROWAN (39) — May 12, Van Wieren 8, Wilson 6, Morton 5, Haywood 4, M. Garrett 2, Houston 2, Wise, Kr. Brown.

Davie 11 10 7 17 — 45

S. Rowan 7 11 9 12 — 39

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Contact Mike London at 704-797-4259 or mlondon@salisburypost.com.