By David Shaw

sports@salisburypost.com

TYRO — It looks like North Rowan isn’t going away.

In a game that was ugly everywhere except where it mattered, the hard-to-figure Cavaliers kept pace in the Central Carolina Conference race with Friday’s 13-0 victory at West Davidson.

“At this point a win is a win,” coach Ben Hampton said after North (3-5, 2-0) settled in atop the league standings. “We didn’t perform the way we wanted to. I feel like we missed a lot of opportunities, but at the end of the day, we’re 2-0 in the conference.”

They got there by playing defense with brawny authority, limiting West Davidson (2-6, 0-2) to six first downs and 83 total yards — including, sit down for this — just one yard on the ground.

“Not to be disrespectful, but they’re not the best team in the world,” said North defensive end Jake Pritchard. “We shut them down every time we had to. They didn’t call the best pass plays and their quarterback did a lot of scrambling, but we got it down.”

North’s defensive effort included a blocked punt by Steven Thurston and six quarterback sacks. The Green Dragons took only nine snaps in North territory and never penetrated deeper than the Cavs’ 39-yard line.

“We did make a couple of mistakes, but it was nothing we couldn’t fix,” explained sophomore DE Matthew Hoosier, who recovered a third-quarter fumble that led to North’s second touchdown. “By the second half everyone was executing. Our front three and everybody on the team was doing what they were supposed to do.”

That defense carried North’s offense, which wasn’t particularly sharp but produced enough to prevail. The Cavs churned out 175 rushing yards while quarterbacks Josh Ellis and Corbin Smith passed for an additional 105. More importantly, they suffered no turnovers, reversing a season-long pattern. “That’s all we can ask,” Hampton said.

North reached the end zone on its second possession after taking over on the West 48-yard line. Three running plays and an Ellis completion to Trey Stoner moved the ball to the 28 and on second-and-4 running back Jaleel Webster took a handoff, jetted into the secondary and scored on a 28-yard run.

“Webster’s a little scat back,” Hampton said after sophomore gained a season-best 82 yards and notched his third touchdown. “He runs the ball very hard and we challenged him to get vertical tonight — run north and south and see what happens. Maybe he’s on to something.”

It certainly looked that way early in the second period when Webster fielded a West punt and returned it 52 yards for a TD, only to have the play nullified by a holding penalty.  North was flagged 13 times for 100 yards, leaving Hampton searching for answers rather than excuses.

“It’s been the same deal all year,” he said. “You can blame it on whatever you want to. The bottom line is if (the refs) see it, or think they see it, they’re going to call it. We’ve got to fix that.”

North padded its lead in the third period when Smith relieved Ellis and fired a 9-yard completion to wideout Desmond Gray. Three plays later Webster bulldozed over right tackle on an 8-yard TD run.

The Cavs used defense to secure the victory in the fourth quarter, which opened with an interception by defensive back Courtney Roseborough. North sacked West quarterback Carter Beck three times in the final period, the last when Hoosier flattened him for a 9-yard loss at his own 5 with three minutes to play.

“Getting pressure on (Beck) was a big thing tonight,” Thurston, a junior lineman. “Stopping the run, getting them to third-and-long and holding them, those were the keys. This game was a confidence booster after such a tough non-conference schedule. It pulled us up to the next level.”