From staff reports

Friday’s roundup …

THOMASVILLE — East Davidson has no answers for North Rowan guard George Maxwell.

Maxwell made five 3-pointers, scored 31 points and pulled down 10 rebounds in Friday’s 86-70 road victory by the Cavaliers. Maxwell scored 30 when North beat the Golden Eagles 82-57 in Spencer.

Maxwell got North started in Friday’s Central Carolina Conference game with 11 first-quarter points, and he made sure the Cavaliers finished strong with 12 in the fourth quarter.

North (10-10, 5-3) got 15 points from Amir Alexander.

Jayden Polk had an impactful game with 11 points, 12 rebounds and three blocks.

Jeremiah Alford chipped in with an efficient 10 points.

Jerricho Charleston and JoJo Tarver were distributors and combined for 11 assists.

North won despite Tegin Hedrick’s 33-point outburst for East Davidson (3-18, 2-6).

The Cavaliers pushed to a 24-11 lead in the first quarter. North led 44-31 after a bucket-trading second quarter,

East Davidson managed to hang around through the third quarter. North never achieved a blowout, but the Cavaliers managed to maintain a double-digit distance.

North entered the game 32nd in the 1A West RPI rankings. The bracket will include 32 teams, so every win — even one against an East Davidson team that is ranked last in 2A — is critical for the Cavaliers.

• Michael Strickland and Ason Best combined for 55 points as North Rowan’s jayvees romped 75-20.

North Rowan    24   20   18   24   — 86

East Davidson   11  20   16    23     — 70

North — Maxwell 31, Alexander 15, Polk 11, Alford 10, Charleston 8, O’Kelly 5, Tarver 4, Sullivan 2.

•••

SALISBURY — One for the books.

The Salisbury Hornets, who have won seven in a row, are capable of explosions and they were demolition men on Friday.

A 26-26 Central Carolina Conference dogfight with South Davidson late in the first half turned into an 82-46 laugher for the Hornets.

The Hornets (14-5, 8-1) outscored the visitors 42-6 in the third quarter and they led by 40 — the magic number for a running clock — early in the fourth.

It was hard to see s blowout coming early. South Davidson led 8-4 early, and the Hornets needed a 3-pointer from Deuce Walker for a 19-15 lead after a quarter.

It was 26-all and South Davidson (6-13, 3-6) had visions of getting to halftime tied with the Hornets, but SHS guard Jalen Chunn scored twice in transition for a 30-26 lead.

Walker scored to stretch the lead to six. Juke Harris got the last bucket of the half for a 34-28 edge.

Salisbury coach Bryan Withers must have delivered an inspiring halftime speech. Salisbury opened the second half on an 18-2 run for a 52-30 lead, and it was all over.

Harris had an interesting 29, with 17 of his points, including several dunks, coming in the third quarter. He turned in a nice all-round game with six rebounds, four blocks and three assists.

Walker scored 13 points and continues to grow as an offensive factor. Mike Geter had 11 points, seven assists and five steals.

Chunn scored 10. He’s defense-first. This was his first double-digit game of the season.

Hank Webb flirted with a double-double with nine points and nine rebounds. Jonathan Ross and Trey Davis added five each. Ross closed Salisbury’s scoring with a 3-pointer.

The Hornets won 77-60, with Harris scoring 42, when the teams played in Denton early in the season.

South Davidson    15    13     6     12   — 46

Salisbury               19     15     42   6     — 82

Salisbury — Harris 29, Walker 13, Geter 11, Chunn 10, Webb 9, Ross 5, Davis 5.

•••

GRANITE QUARRY — Lake Norman is the fifth-place team in the South Piedmont Conference, but it’s a solid fifth-place team, a certain 3A playoff team. with some size and a sharp senior point guard.

That point guard — Isaiah Martino — sliced up East Rowan 72-46 on Friday. Lake Norman Charter also got a lot of points from 6-3 veteran James Carswell and 6-foot-6 sophomore Julian Johnson.

“Martino is good, doesn’t make a lot of mistakes,” East coach Andrew Porter said. “And that’s a very fundamental team.”

Johnson, long and agile, frequently had his way in the paint, especially with East playing without rim protectors Tee Harris and Garrett Lee.

Harris, the No. 2 scorer in Rowan County with almost 24 points a game, missed the contest due to a death in his family.

East had been blown away 91-61 when the teams played in Huntersville early in the season. Harris had scored 25 of East’s 61.

The Mustangs (5-13, 2-8) were able to stay in the game for a half in the rematch, even without Harris. The Knights (10-9, 5-5) settled for a 30-19 lead at the break.

‘It was still a close game at halftime,” Porter said. “We played extremely hard and we gave effort. We were aggressive despite the players we were missing.”

But it was tough to keep Martino from penetrating in the third quarter, and the Knights’ shooters got dialed in.

“They made three straight 3-pointers that hurt us, and we couldn’t recover from it,” Porter said.

Dylan Valley scored 16 to lead the Mustangs. The senior guard bumped his career points total to 967. East hasn’t had a 1,000-point scorer since the 2007-08 season.

Jaden Sprinkle scored seven and Jonathan Wemboula and Jaquare Jones scored six each, but East lacked its usual firepower. The 46 points were the fewest scored by the Mustangs since the opening-night loss to Mount Pleasant..

LN Charter     14    16    22    20  — 72

East Rowan    11       8    13    14   — 46

East — Valley 16, Sprinkle 7, Wembolua 6, Jones 6, Everhart 4, Haynes 4, Danzine 2, Hoesman 1.

•••

LANDIS — South Rowan’s boys survived a visit by Central Cabarrus.

The Vikings won 89-32 in the South Piedmont Conference game, but nothing historic happened.

Central (20-10) is one of the state’s best teams, while South (1-17, 0-10) is struggling and is playing now without some of the talent that helped the Raiders be respectable early in the season.

It was 37-2 after a quarter and 50-4 at halftime, but the Raiders didn’t quit and the Vikings, coached by former Catawba coach Jim Baker, showed mercy.

What sort of halftime speech do you give when you’re down 50-4?

South’s Daniel Blevins gave a pretty good one.

“We challenged our guys to play more free in the second half and we shot the ball much better,” Blevins said. “We’ve got some young guys who are keeping me sane. They’ve played well on the jayvees and some of them moved up and played very well in the varsity game tonight.”

Jayvees against Central Cabarrus is like velociraptors against poodles, but the Raiders did their best and put up 28 points in a running-clock second half, including 17 in the fourth quarter.

Jaiden Thompson scored 11 of his 17 points in the first quarter for Central, which beat South 102-21 early in the season.

Aaron Jones scored seven points for South. Jadon Moore, who usually plays for the jayvees, scored seven, Carter Rohletter, another jayvee standout, made two 3-pointers for his first varsity points.

Central Cabarrus    37    13    23    16   — 89

South Rowan          2       2      11    17   — 32

South — Moore 7, Jones 7, Rohletter 6, Jackson 5, Carey 4, Blackwell 3.

•••

CHINA GROVE — Carson coach Brian Perry isn’t far away from 200 career wins, but he needs five more and may not make it there until the 2023-24 season.

There was some optimism for an upset on Friday as Carson had played a down-to-the-wire game with Concord on the road early in the season, but the Spiders easily won the South Piedmont Conference rematch, 63-39.

It was a season low offensive production for the Cougars. They normally score around 60.

“Just struggled to score the ball all night,” Perry said. “Didn’t make many shots and their big guy (Jeremiah Howard) killed us.”

Howard, who is 6-foot-6, 240 pounds, was a difficult matchup for the Cougars. He scored eight early as the Spiders (12-7, 7-3) built a lead and he finished with a game-high 18 points.

The Spiders played without James Smith, one of their top players, but Howard and Brayden Blue (15 points) did enough to hand the Cougars (8-11, 1-9) their third straight loss.

Perry pointed at Carson’s last possession of the first half as a turning point.

Carson was down 27-20 at that point, had the ball and was looking to take the last shot of the half. But Carson turned it over, Concord made a 3-pointer, and the deficit at halftime was 30-20.

Then the Spiders settled it with a dominating — 23-8 — third quarter.

Carson played without scorer Mikey Beasley and without Tristen McBride, who possesses the Cougars’ biggest body and a willingness to battle inside.

Jay McGruder had another big game to lead Carson. He’s really been coming on since he had a big Christmas tournament. He scored 16 and has scored 16 or more in four of his last five outings.

But McGruder was the only Cougar in double figures. BJ Howard scored nine.

Concord   19    11    23    10   — 63

Carson     11      9      8      11  — 39

Carson — McGruder 16, Howard 9, Taylor 5, Drye 3, Guida 2, Ball 2, Burleyson 2.