PITTSBORO — As they say, there’s no place like home.
After fending off a scrappy Southern Alamance team to carry a four-point advantage into halftime, Northwood outscored the Lady Patriots 14-7 in the third period to open up a comfortable lead before pulling away down the stretch to claim a 50-35 victory in first-round action of the NCHSAA 2020 Women’s 3A East basketball state playoffs last Tuesday in Lewis Norwood Gymnasium.
Winning their 12th game in a row while improving to 13-1 at home and 21-5 overall, the sixth-seed Lady Chargers moved on to 22nd-seed Person (16-8) Thursday evening, whereas 27th-seed Southern Alamance finished 9-16 for the year.
TeKeyah Bland tossed in 20 points for the victors, while Natalie Bell and McKenna Snively chipped in eight each. Northwood connected on 41 percent (19-of-46) of its attempts from the field while turning the ball over a dozen times.
Alyssa Jacobson topped the Lady Patriots with 16 points as Southern Alamance shot 38 percent (12-of-32) from the floor and held a 27-18 edge in rebounds, but it wasn’t enough to offset 25 turnovers.
“I wasn’t pleased with our defense the first half as we gave up too many drives inside while allowing Southern Alamance to box us out on the boards,” said Lady Chargers’ coach Cameron Vernon. “But I thought we came out and set the tone for the rest of the night in the first four minutes of the third quarter when we went from a zone defense to man-to-man, pressuring the ball to force turnovers while moving our feet to not let them beat us to the basket. We also got better rotation on our help-side defense, while offensively we had good ball movement in the second half that forced them to chase us as we looked for good shots.”
Lady Patriots’ coach Amy Sarratt stated after keeping the game close in the first half, her team’s drop-off on offense along with its inability to handle Northwood’s press after intermission paved the way for the Lady Chargers’ triumph.
“They picked up their defense in the second half and forced us into making bad passes, while we just couldn’t convert on offense,” Sarratt said. “Rebounding was a big key that kept us in the game the first half, but Northwood did a much better job on the boards after the break and didn’t give us many second-chance opportunities.”
After Jacobson’s turnaround bucket in the paint gave Southern Alamance its only lead at 4-2 with 5:28 left in the initial stanza, Bland’s jumper in the lane followed by Rae McClarty’s midcourt steal and layup a minute later put the Lady Chargers ahead to stay.
Behind a pair of Bell three-pointers from the right wing, Northwood surged to a 16-7 advantage with 1:29 remaining in the opening frame prior to a Jacobson charity toss and Brianna Gallagher’s jumper from the right side that drew the Lady Patriots within six at the end of the period.
Following Jacobson’s trey from the right wing that pulled the visitors from Mt. Hermon within 21-20 with 3:39 to go in the first half, the Lady Chargers countered a Lacy Mills foul shot with baskets by Bell and Jillian McNaught to forge a 25-21 lead at intermission.
Gianna McManaman’s three-pointer from the left wing to begin the third quarter sparked a 7-2 Northwood run that boosted the winner’s advantage to 32-23 midway through the stanza, and after Caity Russell’s layup trimmed Southern Alamance’s deficit to 36-28 with 1:20 left in the period, Hannah Kanapkey’s trey from the left corner with 25.7 seconds on the clock sent the Lady Chargers into the final quarter with a 39-28 lead.
Northwood then never let its advantage dip below double digits the rest of the night while fashioning its largest lead at 48-30 on a Chandler Adams layup with 3:55 remaining to play.