CHINA GROVE — If you want to get Sydney Huffman to smile, ask her about Jan. 27.

That’s the night she couldn’t miss in the Carson gym. The Carson senior had a career game with 22 points and led the Cougars to a 62-48 win against West Rowan. It was an efficient 22. She shot 3-for-4 on 3-pointers, 5-for-9 on inside the arc and 3-for-4 on free throws.

“I felt like I was a big threat, and I don’t know if I’ve ever felt quite like that before,” Huffman said. “I made a bunch of 3-pointers (and some long twos) in a row. It was a great feeling.”

Huffman was recruited by Guilford, a Division III school in Greensboro, and will continue her education and basketball career with the Quakers in fall. No one who saw her that night against West Rowan doubts she’ll be an asset to Guilford’s program.

“Guilford saw me play in a lot of AAU tournaments with the Winston-Salem Stealers,” Huffman said. ‘Then they came to some of my high school games.”

The 5-foot-9 Huffman is a testament to work ethic. She’s steadily gotten better. She was a jayvee as a freshman. As a sophomore reserve, she played in 16 of Carson’s 29 varsity games and averaged 2.6 points per game. As a junior, she started for the first time and averaged 6.4 points. As a senior, she averaged 9.7 points and scored in double figures 11 times.

Besides the 22 against West Rowan, she scored 21 against Central Cabarrus and 19 against Concord.

“Sydney has embodied just staying after it,” Carson coach Brooke Misenheimer said. “She’s shown some of the most tremendous improvement of anyone I’ve ever coached and she has an enthusiasm that’s infectious.”

The scouting report says Huffman isn’t a great shooter or ballhandler, but she’s never outworked or outhustled. She plays basketball like a linebacker. Her motor is always running. Down 20, she’s not giving up.

Many of Huffman’s layups came from sprinting when opponents were jogging. Teammates Alex Allen and Olivia Gabriel were always looking up the floor to see if Huffman was running ahead of the pack.

How Huffman played was frequently an indicator of how Carson (12-13) was going to play. Carson was 8-3 when Huffman scored in double figures.

Huffman, who has a year-round commitment to basketball with workouts and AAU games, shot a stellar 48 percent from the field on her 2-point attempts as a senior. She shot 66 percent from the foul line.

“Going on from high school to play college ball isn’t typical or ordinary,” Misenheimer said. “It’s very special. This is my ninth year, and Sydney and Alex (Allen) are just the third and fourth girls we’ve had to accomplish that.”