Staff report

REIDSVILLE — Salisbury’s boys basketball team ended the season for the third straight year with a loss against Reidsville deep in the 2A state playoffs.

Salisbury fell to the powerful Rams 77-69 on Friday. It was a competitive game staged in front of an overflow crowd, but there never was much doubt about the outcome. Reidsville led 8-0 from the jump, and while the Hornets got back as close as 11-10 in the early going, the Rams led by as many as 16 and were on top from wire to wire.

Point guard Dionte Neal led Reidsville with 30 points. Johnniyus Sharpe scored 20, including two big 3-pointers at the outset. Kendre Harrison, the 6-foot-7 tight end headed to Oregon for basketball and football, had his dunks, but he wasn’t as devastating as Neal and Sharpe.

Defending state champ Reidsville (29-0) has won 58 straight games.

Salisbury had a 25-game winning streak stopped. The Hornets hadn’t lost since they fell to Bishop McGuinness 58-48 on Dec. 7.

The Rams stopped Salisbury in the fourth round in 2023. They beat the Hornets in a neutral-court regional final in 2024.

Reidsville was bigger and quicker, and the Hornets (26-4) had a very difficult time scoring in the first half. They weren’t making outside shots and they weren’t finishing drives. The Hornets trailed 17-10 after a quarter and were in a 36-21 hole at halftime.

Myles Smith finished with 21 points. Braylon Taylor got rolling in the second half and kept the Hornets in the game with some tough drives. He scored a career-high 27.

Smith scored 20-plus for the 12th straight game.

Bryce Dalton added nine points on three 3-pointers, while Macari House made two 3s and had eight.

Reidsville led by 16 in the third quarter at 53-37 and took a 61-46 lead to the final eight minutes.

Taylor’s 13-point third quarter helped the Hornets narrow the gap. Smith scored 11 in the fourth quarter, as Salisbury eventually cut Reidsville’s lead down to six, but there were only 11 seconds left at that point, and free throws by the Rams sealed victory.

There were some stoppages of play in the fourth quarter as police dealt with crowd control issues.

Reidsville moves on to play Bandys, a Cinderella 15 seed, in Thursday’s regional final at Joel Coliseum.

Salisbury went 75-14 the last three seasons and is 53-8 in Albert Perkins’ two seasons as head coach.

Salisbury  10   11   25  23   — 69

Reidsville  17   19   25  16   — 77

SALISBURY scoring — Taylor 27, M. Smith 21, Dalton 9, House 8, Davis 2, Webb 2.