By Marny Hendrick

sports@salisburypost.com

GRANITE QUARRY — East Rowan head coach Kevin Holland always wants his team to play a pressing, full-court defense, but in past games it has not always worked out.

Friday night at home, everything clicked defensively for East, leading to a lot of points and a solid 64-45 North Piedmont Conference win over South Iredell.

“I have been tweaking our press a bit, formation-wise, but we weren’t always putting ourselves in scoring position after takeaways,” Holland said. “Tonight, we were able to get into scoring position and it paid off.”

Led by point guard Adalie Harrison (six steals) and forward Mary Spry (four steals), the Mustangs harassed the visiting Vikings from the first quarter on, leading to some good looks inside or trips to the foul line. For the game, East had an unofficial 15 steals and at least that many disruptions and deflections.

East led, 17-11, after one quarter, then went up by as many as 13 points before halftime.

South Iredell made a brief run to open the second half, behind point guard Sarah Nelson, to get within 32-26. But East answered with layups by Grace Eagle and Spry, then two penetrating drives by Harrison, to get comfortably ahead by double digits.

The Vikings got no closer than nine points the rest of the way as East closed the final quarter with a 14-7 margin.

The biggest concern on an otherwise productive night for East was the number of fouls. The Mustangs committed 21 infractions to 15 for South Iredell, leading to a total of 46 free throw attempts combined.

“We were just fouling way too much,” Holland said. “We were playing too much with our hands and not enough with our feet. It really bogged the game down because we definitely wanted to run.”

The strong offensive effort for East (12-4, 1-2 NPC) was led by Harrison and Spry with 20 points each. Spry also grabbed 10 rebounds as part of her defensive effort.

“I think we were cutting a lot better and setting the screens,” Spry said, of her ability to get loose down the lane. “I guess we were just ready to win one.”

Junior guard Brooke Mitchell came off the bench for 11 points, including a couple of key rebound follow shots as East was building a lead. Grace Eagle contributed nine points for the winners.

South Iredell (4-10, 0-3 NPC) placed no one in double figures as Kayla Wightman scored nine points and Lydia Mercer added eight, respectively. Nelson, who leads the Vikings at 14.1 points per game, managed just five against the East defense. The loss was the seventh in a row for the Vikings.

East Rowan will have a week off before hosting a strong Statesville team next Friday, fresh off an impressive win over previously unbeaten Carson.

SOUTH IREDELL (45) — Wightman 9, Mercer 8, Houser 6, King 6, Nelson 5, Helilgenthaler 4, Labelle 4, Bell 2, Kimmell 1, Durham.

EAST ROWAN (63) — Harrison 20, Spry 20, Mitchell 11, Eagle 9, Houpe 2, Winford 1, Honeycutt, Miller, Peeler, Fleming, Fraley, Ali.

South Iredell    11   12   15    7 — 45

East Rowan      17   15   17   14 — 63