By Mike London

mike.london@salisburypost.com

SPENCER — It got feisty and chippy at the end, and for West Davidson’s girls, that wasn’t a bad sign at all.
The Green Dragons showed on Tuesday in a 48-38 Central Carolina Conference loss at second-place North Rowan that they’re ready to compete. By Friday, they might be ready to win.
“Last year when we played West Davidson it really wasn’t much,” North senior Aliyah Farmer said. “They’ve stepped up their game a whole lot since then. They looked tonight like they’re a team that’s tired of losing.”
West Davidson (0-20, 0-7 CCC) looked surprisingly competent for a team still chasing that elusive first win. The Green Dragons have good height, some shooters and a capable guard in Makayla Sink, who scored 12 points.
North (14-5, 6-1 CCC) won the first meeting this season in Tyro, 67-30. This time it was a lot different. North bolted to an 18-4 lead after a quarter, but West Davidson refused to get blown out. North’s lead actually dipped to single digits several times in the fourth quarter.
“West Davidson is decent and there were times tonight when West Davidson was a lot more than decent,” North coach Brian Lytton said. “The shooting was good on their part tonight and it was bad on our part.”
North got 13 points from Farmer and 11 from Special Washington, who is closing in on 1,000 for her career, but the Cavaliers shot poorly and frequently failed to finish inside against long-armed West Davidson defenders Mary Nebrich and Karlie Cook.
“We did miss a lot of easy shots,” Farmer said. “We were looking ahead to our next game (at unbeaten East Davidson on Friday), and it wasn’t one of our best efforts.”
After North’s strong first quarter, Jenna Burkhart made two second-quarter 3-pointers that got West Davidson back in the game. North needed a 3-pointer at the horn from Tajah Oglesby to take a 29-17 halftime lead.
When Washington found Farmer for a layup early in the second half the Cavaliers led by 14, and Farmer made a left-handed shot in the lane moments later to push the edge to 15.
But that’s as far behind as West Davidson would ever get. In the second half, the Green Dragons outscored North 21-19.
“We were penetrating, making some great reads and some great passes, and that’s something we’ve really been working on,” Lytton said. “But we’ve got to finish better. We didn’t make our layups tonight.”

WEST DAVIDSON (38) — Sink 12, Nebrich 9, Cook 6, Burkhart 6, Sharpe 5.
NORTH ROWAN (48) — Farmer 13, Washington 11, White 8, Godfrey 5, Russell 4, Oglesby 3, Lytton 2, Robinson 2, Allen.

West Davidson 4 13 11 10 — 38
North Rowan 18 11 9 10 — 48