By Ryan Bisesi
rbisesi@salisburypost.com
MOUNT ULLA — Chloe Monroe kept shooting and her team kept building its lead.
It was no coincidence as Carson took over with a standout third quarter where Monroe drained four 3-pointers as beating rival West Rowan didn’t lose its luster for the Cougars in a 50-42 win on Friday night.
Monroe finished with a game-high 23 points, 19 of which came in the second half.
“I don’t know,” said Monroe quite meekly. “I just finally started hitting some stuff and I think once you hit one, you get some momentum.”
Carson (13-4, 7-1 NPC) stayed a game behind North Iredell in the 3-A North Piedmont Conference standings going into their showdown with the Raiders on Tuesday.
“ West Rowan kept a slim lead for much of the first half and never trailed despite playing without leading scorer Ayana Avery, who served the last of her two-game suspension. Shay Steele picked up the slack with a triple-double, scoring 17 points, grabbing 12 rebounds and 11 blocks.
“We were up two at halftime and that lead should have been six to 10,” West coach Erich Epps said.
Allison Parker’s only two points of the night came with 50 seconds left in the first half to hand West a 19-17 edge at the break. After halftime, Monroe nailed a trey with 7:25 left and Carson never trailed again.
“I thought we had a really bad first half,” Carson coach Brooke Misenheimer said. “The difference in the game was our third quarter. We came out and got stops on defense. We knocked shots down.”
Carson’s Sarrah Holman, who finished with 10 points, knocked down a jumper to put the Cougars up 32-25 right before West’s Nycieko Dixon was called for a technical foul for reacting to a personal foul. Monroe moved her accuracy to the foul line, hitting two free throws before canning another trey for a double-digit advantage. It was a damper on an otherwise solid night for the starting point guard, who managed 15 points.
“They said she flipped her hair or something,” Epps said. “The referee I guess saw that as a gesture opposing his call.”
Carson pushed its lead to 39-26 at the end of the third quarter, where they scored 22 points after netting just 17 in the first half.
The Falcons were erratic from the foul line, hitting 10-of-20 free throws.
CARSON (50)— Monroe 23, Holman 10, Blackwell 9, Dulkoski 4, Cloninger 2, Phillips 2, Clark, White, Barringer, Stirewalt.
WEST ROWAN (42) — Steele 17, Dixon 15, Barber 5, Dalton 2, Parker 2, Caldwell 1, Watson, Harrington, Sobatoka, Miller, Ball.
Carson 8 9 22 11 — 50
W. Rowan 11 8 7 16 — 42