By Mike London
mike.london@salisburypost.com

LANDIS — History doesn’t always come with trumpets blaring and cannons firing.

Sometimes history arrives quietly. North Rowan senior Bailee Goodlett entered her school’s girls basketball record books softly on Wednesday night at South Rowan with an efficient, 45-point performance in a 75-32, running-clock victory.

It was a mid-week, non-conference matchup between county schools that aren’t major rivals. Both South varsity squads are struggling, so the one-sided action unfolded in front of officials, parents, grandparents, close friends, diehard fans and a lot of empty bleacher seats.

Young coach Darra Walker’s Cavaliers are good, capable of a serious 1A playoff run, and every game is a new opportunity to show what they can do. They have two of the county’s best players in seniors Goodlett and Brittany Ellis. North had no problem creating positive energy from the start, taking command quickly on the road.

Ellis, who has made a huge leap from solid junior to awesome senior, came out firing, like she might set some records herself. A perennial track and field state champ in the throws, she swished two 3-pointers right away for 6-0. Goodlett, a 5-foot-4 buzz saw, got a steal and layup for her first two, and it was 8-0.

South (3-15) plays against teams such as West Rowan, Robinson and Northwest Cabarrus in the 3A South Piedmont Conference that have quick guards, but Goodlett is a little different than anyone the Raiders try to deal with in league games. Goodlett has more than stellar foot speed and lightning quickness. She has supernatural anticipation. When North gets after people aggressively, she knows where the next desperate pass is likely to be headed. Frequently, her speed gets her there to intercept it, and then she can dribble faster than most girls can sprint. She can go from defense to offense in a flash. She was zipping past retreating Raiders like they were trapped in a slow-motion replay.

The other thing college coaches should like about Goodlett is she makes 99 percent of her layups. Most high school players, even the good ones, miss quite a few. On nearly every layup opportunity, Goodett makes it or she gets fouled. Sometimes, both things happen. That comes from unusual focus and from being stronger than her slight frame would suggest.

Goodlett made it 10-0, 12-0 and 14-0 on Wednesday, a spinning whirlwind of layups, before South (3-15) finally got its first bucket from Kynlee Dextraze.

Goodlett scored 13 straight points for the Cavaliers before Ellis battled for the stick-back that made it 21-8.

After a quarter, North (14-3) led 24-9, with Goodlett and Ellis accounting for 22.

South continued a fruitless search for a defender who could stay in front of Goodlett for more than half a second in the second quarter. Two minutes into that quarter, 10 minutes into the game, Goodlett had 20 points. She had 26 at halftime on two free throws, 11 layups and one long 2 — she had a foot on the 3-point line.

At the half, North led 42-17. Goodlett and Ellis had teamed for 40. North’s third scorer, Dasia Elder, a girl who used to win the Elks Hoop Shoot contest every year, hadn’t gotten anything to fall.

Elder did make two nice shots in the third quarter, while Bloom Goodlett made one. Bloom is Bailee’s twin, but while they were born back-to-back, they don’t have much in common on the basketball court, other than playing hard for the same team. Bloom is several inches taller and is mostly a factor on defense.

Bailee only scored six in the third quarter, boosting her total to 32. When Ellis converted a three-point play at the end of the quarter, the Cavaliers led 59-21, and had the game under control.

When little guard Alyssa Mason made a 3-pointer with 6:07 left, North’s lead was 66-25, a 41-point lead, which meant the clock would run continuously, even on free throws, the rest of the game, unless someone called timeout. Goodlett had 36 points at that point, and she got to stay in. The North record for a single game was 43 points. Goodlett had scored 40 twice last season and could easily have broken the record both times, but sat down early. But now she’s a senior, this might be her last shot to do it, and she was given the chance.

Bailee made three long shots over the next few minutes, one of them a 3-pointer with 3:45 left, just to show the doubters that she can shoot. Her record-breaking shot for 45 came from mid-range, and North called a timeout with about 1:30 left to take her out of the game. There probably will be some sort of presentation and maybe a special ball for her at North’s next home game.

Bailee had six assists and six steals in addition to the 45 points. Ellis had 19 points (all in the first three quarters) and eight rebounds.

Dextraze led South with 11 points. Meghan Eagle scored seven, while Day Pharr had six.

•••

North’s girls basketball history dates back to the 1958-59 season. The Cavaliers’ first girls basketball team was 3-16, but a player named Billie Sharpe made things exciting. In the fourth game played by North’s girls, Sharpe scored 34 points in a 62-42 loss to Mount Ulla.

In the 1959-60 season, playing for North’s football coach Burt Barger, Sharpe improved on her program record with a 37-point effort against Mooresville.

That record didn’t long. either. In a loss to West Rowan in 1961-62, still playing in the 6-on-6 girls era, Faith Wraight scored 40 for the Cavaliers.

Forty was hard to beat, so Wraight’s record stood as the North standard for 27 seasons. Then in the 1988-89 season, Lola Jones, who became an All-American at Bluefield State,  scored 41 points against Southwest Guilford.

On opening night of the 1993-94 season, Stephanie Cross, who went on to a strong career at Maryland, scored 43 for the Cavaliers in a 74-68 win against Lexington.

Cross’ 43 survived frequent challenges by Sophilia Hipps, who would go on to star at South Carolina State. Hipps’ peak game for North Rowan was 40 points. That was another opening-night effort. It came in an 83-68 loss in the 2003-04 season to a very strong West Rowan team.

Jones and Cross, both of whom played for coach Gary Atwell, are in the Salisbury-Rowan Sports Hall of Fame. Hipps, who played for coach Mike White, will join them at some point.

Cross’ mark stood for 30 seasons.

North Rowan      24    18    17    16    — 75

South Rowan     9        8     8       7     — 32

NORTH — Bailee Goodlett 45, Ellis 19, Elder 4, Mason 3, Oglesby 2, Bloom Goodlett 2.

SOUTH — Dextraze 11, Eagle 7, Pharr 6, Fisher 4, Menius 4.