By Mike London
Salisbury Post
MOUNT ULLA — Ashley Poole is the Post’s Rowan County Coach of the Year for girls basketball for the fourth time in her 13 seasons at West Rowan.
Poole coached a 25-3 team in 2025-26, and while not many basketball coaches will ever get the chance to guide a 25-win club, Poole has coached three teams that won even more often. There was a 27-3, a 31-0 and a 31-1. The latter two were not long ago. Both won state championships.
Poole, who was Ashley Boulware when she played for the Hornets in the 1990s, was also named South Piedmont Conference Coach of the Year. West went 13-1 and tied Northwest Cabarrus for first place.
This was a comeback season for the Falcons, who finished ninth when the South Piedmont Conference was a nine-team league in 2024-25. As the odd team out, West didn’t even get to participate in the 2025 conference tournament. The Falcons closed the books at 2-21, didn’t win a single league game and didn’t win a game against a team in their classification.
“We were playing with a lot of freshmen, and it was a hard season,” Poole said. “We’d get beat by 50 some nights, but the girls would still show up for practice the next day ready to go. They never stopped working to get better. It’s just a very good group of girls.”
If West had simply returned that same group of girls, the Falcons probably could have improved to eight to 10 wins this season. But they also welcomed back two key players. Aubrey Martin, a dead-eye shooter, missed the whole 2024-2025 season with an ACL injury, while Tiara Thompson elected to play her junior season in Maryland. When Martin returned to health and Thompson, one of the best guards in school history, returned to West for her senior season, the results were epic. West went from a drizzle to a hurricane. West’s rise was massive in a league where a number of teams (Robinson, East Rowan, Concord) had subtracted a lot of talent and had dropped a notch. Eleven of West’s 13 SPC wins were by more than 20 points.
Jumping from two wins to 25, West enjoyed the biggest turnaround season — plus 23— ever recorded in Rowan County girls basketball.
The previous largest jump by a West team (plus 17) had been by one of Poole’s early teams. The Falcons won 10 in 2014-15 and won 27 in 2015-16.
North Rowan had a 19-game jump from one win in 2001-02 to 20 wins in 2002-03. That was the previous county record for a one-season climb.
Salisbury’s biggest jump ever was recent, as the Hornets were 14-2 in the shortened 2020-21 COVID season and jumped to 28 wins in the state championship season of 2021-22.
South Rowan’s biggest jump was from six wins in 2012-13 to 18 wins in 2013-14.
East Rowan and Carson haven’t had huge swings often. They’ve generally been gradual builders. East has enjoyed a couple of nine-win jumps, including a very recent one. East won 12 in 2023-24 and won 21 in 2024-25.
Carson jumped from two wins in 2008-09 to 11 wins in 2009-10 for a gain of nine.
The bottom line is that even in a historic context, West’s season was special.
“A lot of people were after me to retire after the 2-21, they said I was ruining my record with these girls,” Poole said. “Look, I honestly don’t know what my record is. All I know is I enjoy coaching basketball and I really liked this group of girls. Tiara and Aubrey scored a lot of points and as seniors their experience meant a lot to us, but people shouldn’t overlook that their supporting cast was pretty good. It was very satisfying for me to see those girls, who hung in there through tough times, have some success.”
West didn’t get the ideal draw for the 5A state playoffs. Even though the Falcons were the 2 seed in the 5A West bracket, they were opposed by North Lincoln in the third round. North Lincoln was a 23 seed in the bracket and barely got in the bracket due to forfeiting 17 wins, but was a No. 1 seed as far as talent and proved it by winning the state championship.
North Lincoln had a heck of a fight with the Falcons in Mount Ulla. West may have played its best game of the season, but still lost 79-71. Thompson scored 49 in her final game.
“If we could have beaten North Lincoln, I think we had a shot at winning state,” Poole said. “I really do.”
West’s other two losses this season were to the 25-5 Northwest Cabarrus team that North Lincoln beat in the fourth round. West was ninth in the final statewide MaxPreps rankings for 5A.
From 2-21 to 25-3, it was quite a ride for Poole and the Falcons. History was made.
Poole’s record, while she doesn’t lose sleep over it, is a very good one. She has 233 wins and 105 losses, a winning percentage of .689.
