By Jordanna Clark

sports@salisburypost.com

SALISBURY — The North Rowan girls needed a way to redeem themselves after putting up a new tournament low of 12 points on Thursday.

Luckily, an opportunity presented itself for the Cavaliers less than a day later.
Propelled by a 20-point third period and scoring nearly four times as many points as the day before, North Rowan defeated Davie County, 43-40, in the Dale’s Sporting Goods/Sam Moir Christmas Classic on Friday afternoon at Goodman Gym.
“We turned it up by transitioning it over to the defensive end,” North coach Ron Bost said in response to his team’s 20-point third period. “It’s a lot easier to get them to play defense when we’re actually scoring some points.”
Fifth-seeded North Rowan (4-5) made 8-for-12 from the field in the third period while the eighth-seeded War Eagles (2-9) made just 2-for-12.
After halftime, the Cavaliers’ first field goal came when Taren Sherrill earned her
only steal of the game and drove the length of court for a layup, making it 21-17.
With three minutes left to go in the third period, freshman Natavia Taborn gave North a 27-25 lead with her one and only 3-pointer of the game.
For the remainder of the period, the Cavaliers and the War Eagles tied the game four
times until a layup by freshman Makiya McDaniel put North up by two points — with 30 seconds to go, closing the 20-point period with a 34-32 lead.
“I told them to start shooting the ball,” said Bost. “I told them to take the shots that were given to them.”
While North only held a two-point lead heading into the final period, Davie was unable to muster a finish.
“We were not playing our man defense the way that we were taught to play man
defense,” Coach Kevin Revels said. “We had a lot of people playing individual defense instead of playing team defense and it hurt us.”
North was able to capitalize on Davie’s defensive woes following halftime. Taborn
scored eight of her nine points in the second half to lead the Cavaliers. Robinson and
junior McKenzie Shoaf both finished with eight points. Myanna Hillie tacked on
six points of her own in the second half after being scoreless at halftime. Junior Jaylan Reid led both teams on the boards with nine rebounds.
“We’re very young and it’s a hassle sometimes,” said Bost. “I think that we’re getting
there, so we’re going to get our stride at about the right time.”

Davie’s Morgan Lewis was the only player for both teams in double figures with 10
points. After finishing with 25 points on Thursday against top-seeded Salisbury, Trinity Hayes contributed just eight points.
“We have to work on everything,” said Revels. “We’re the number eight seed and we
played like the number eight seed today and we have a long way to go to get better.”
Davie will have a chance to get its first win of the tournament at 9 a.m. on Saturday
against sixth-seeded North Stanly for seventh place.
North will have a shot at fifth place at noon against seventh-seeded East
Rowan.

DAVIE COUNTY (40) — M. Lewis 10, Hayes 8, Tellup 7, Jones 5, K. Lewis 3, Carter 2, Hartsell 2, Caldwell 2, Caldwell 1, Visser, Dalton.
NORTH ROWAN (43) — Taborn 9, Robinson 8, Shoaf 8, Hillie 6, McDaniel 4, Reid 2, Sherrill 2, Hill 2, Brown 2, Robbins, Cain, Sifford.

 

Davie County         9   10   13   8 — 40

North Rowan         7    7    20   9 — 43