By Mike London
Salisbury Post
9th in a series of reports on local basketball teams …
LANDIS — When South Rowan’s boys blew out Gray Stone on opening night, it marked only the third time South has won a boys basketball game in the last five seasons.
Early games this season at A.L. Brown and Mount Pleasant didn’t go nearly as well — they are quite a bit better than Gray Stone — but South (1-3) was able to compete at home against a decent Union Academy Charter squad, threatening to win, before finally losing by eight. Just having a chance was exciting and meant progress.
South coach Justin Pauley is determined to bring the excitement back to Friday nights in the South gym, You can accomplish some of that with celebrity singers, lively cheerleaders and light shows, but most of the restoration of enthusiasm will depend on the product South is able to put on the court.
Besides the Gray Stone romp, South’s only other triumphs in recent memory came at Thomasville shortly after Pauley replaced Daniel Blevins as head coach in the midst of the 2024-25 season and against West Iredell on opening night of the 2022-23 season.
South is 0-60 in South Piedmont Conference play since the Raiders moved back to the SPC after a four-year run of competing against Davidson County schools in the Central Carolina Conference.
Zero for 60 is a daunting stat, and the SPC isn’t getting noticeably weaker. Salisbury, Carson and Robinson should be about as good as anyone in the 4A and 5A classifications in 2025-26.
Pauley is as upbeat and optimistic as it’s possible to be. He praises the Raiders for their work ethic and attitudes and they made progress during a good off-season and preseason. But South still may be an underdog in every SPC game it plays again in 2025-26. South had a lot of seniors in 2024-25, has no returning starters, and will be heavily reliant on first-year varsity players.
Brody Thomas, a junior transfer from East Rowan, would have been an impact player, a sure-thing 15 points every night, but he went down with an ACL injury prior to the season.
Together, Thomas and Pauley’s son, 6-foot-5 freshman Anderson Pauley, would have given South a strong 1-2 punch, but now Pauley will have to shoulder a serious chunk of the scoring load. He’s good, he scores inside and outside just like his father did for the Raiders in the late 1990s, and he may even average 20, but to win SPC games you usually need to score at least 65. It’s not clear yet where the rest of the points are going to come from for the Raiders.
“We’ve got 28 guys in the program and all 28 are working every day to get better,” Coach Pauley said. “There was a lot of interest this year. We had to cut some guys at tryouts. I’m proud of the work our coaches and players are putting in. We all want to build something good.”
South has only two players back who played significant minutes. Mason Long was in the rotation last season. Brycen Burris was further down the bench, but he did get some experience in SPC games. Long scored 42 points last season, while Burris scored 28.
“Long is a good vocal leader and will score some for us, while Burris has outside shooting ability,” Pauley said.
Long and Burris are the seniors, along with Zach Robinson, who gives the Raiders some size, and Ryan Kluttz, who transferred to South after performing in a limited role at Carson. Kluttz scored 13 points for the Cougars last season.
Junior guard Dacorian Pharr will be a key player. He’s an athletic guy — he had a kickoff return touchdown in the football playoffs — and may be able to give the Raiders double-figure outings.
“He’s a spark-plug,” Pauley said. “He’s a good finisher and he plays the game with passion.”
Junior Aaiden Sechler — yes, he spells his first name with back-to-back A’s — is a transfer from West Rowan who helped South on the football field. Sechler is expected to give the Raiders some 3-point shooting.
Keegan Strickland is a pass-first point guard in the junior class and will be expected to be a key player.
Brylan Sloop is an aggressive defender who will get plenty of minutes.
Case Beaver is a sturdy, 220-pound sophomore post man. He played a little on the varsity last season.
Korbin Childers, Maverick Morgan, Tashon Boulware and Carlos Cordova all appeared in the scorebook in South’s loss at Mount Pleasant on Tuesday, so the Raiders plan on giving a lot of players a chance to show they can help.
Pauley has assembled a large coaching staff that includes his former South teammate Tony Propst. The Raiders also have a regular motivational speaker.
The Raiders will give it everything they have every Tuesday and Friday, but the SPC is still the SPC. There are going to be some long nights.
In 2026-27, if Thomas returns healthy and Pauley has a solid year under his belt, things might look a whole lot different.
