Staff report
CHINA GROVE — West Rowan’s girls basketball team cruised 61-27 against Carson on Saturday, completing a worst-to-first turnaround in the South Piedmont Conference.
The Falcons were 2-21 and went 0-16 in the SPC, which was a nine-team league in 2024-25. This season, the Falcons are 22-1 and went 13-1 in the SPC. West has won all of its home games. The lone loss was a thriller at Northwest Cabarrus. The Falcons share first place in the SPC with the Trojans, who also are 20-game winners. Both teams will get lofty seeds in the 5A state playoffs.
The return of Tiara Thompson and the comeback of Aubrey Martin are obvious reasons for West’s historic turnaround, but the girls who took the 2-21 beating last season also deserve some credit. They’re still around. They are mostly sophomores and they have provided a strong supporting cast for the senior standouts.
Julia Burleson, one of the heroines of Carson’s win against South Rowan on Friday, made two 3s in the first quarter, but West Rowan shut her down after that, and Carson, playing without Rylee Hedrick and Brooklyn Johnson, didn’t have many ways to score. Freshman Cambie Perry led the Cougars with nine points.
“We played hard,” Carson head coach Chloe Monroe said. “We were just overmatched.”
Thompson scored a breezy 22 points for the Falcons and topped 20 for the 11th straight game. Martin has been alternating hot games with quiet games lately. She had a hot one — two 3s and 14 points. Luci Pharr had eight. Sydney Smith scored seven.
West is the 2 seed for the conference tournament and is home Monday against 7 seed East Rowan. Carson (10-11, 7-7) is seeded fifth and will play at 4 seed South Rowan.
West Rowan 21 15 13 12 — 61
Carson 11 6 3 7 — 27
WEST — Thompson 22, A. Martin 14, Pharr 8, S. Smith 7, Hurd 5, Allen 4, E. Smith 1.
CARSON — Perry 9, Burleson 6, Snow 5, Faggart 4, Braylee Johnson 3.
