From staff reports

Hannah Waddell shot 10-over 82 in Monday’s first round of the 3A State Championships and led East Rowan’s golfers to a tie for third place.

The second and final round will be played today on the Grey Course at Foxfire.

Waddell shot 38 on the back nine and made birdies on 10 and 16. Her round also included six pars.

She’s in sixth place individually, seven shots back of Eastern Alamance’s Emily Mathews, who shot 75 to take the top spot on the leaderboard.

Matthews was the 3A state champ last May.

Emma Callahan shot 49-53 — 102 for the Mustangs. She made four pars to help offset two quadruple bogeys.

Addison Queen shot 51-57 — 108 for East. She had two double-digit holes, but she also made four pars.

In team scoring, East fared well. The Mustangs were 76-over for the first day, but they’re only seven shots back of the leader, Fike.

East is one shot behind second-place Rockingham County and is tied with Union Pines.

“We’re still in striking distance,” East coach Tinsley Merrell said.

•••

In the 1A/2A State Championships at Longleaf, Gray Stone shot 59-over and is in third place in the team scoring. The Knights are 12 strokes behind Newton-Conover and three behind Raleigh Charter.

Katelyn Griggs paced Gray Stone with a 3-over 74 and is the individual leader. She made two birdies, 12 pars, three bogeys and a double bogey.

Hannah Lineberry shot 92 for Gray Stone, while Ilka Kuleba shot 106 and Allison Frey shot 110.

Salisbury’s Sydney Hlavacek is competing as an individual. She shot 65-51 — 116 and made two pars.

College golf

GREENSBORO — Nick Lyerly, the former East Rowan standout, won his second straight collegiate tournament on Sunday.

The UNC Greensboro graduate student won the Grandover Championship on his home course.

Lyerly won the Wolfpack Intercollegiate at the Lonnie Poole Course in Raleigh last weekend.

Lyerly is  the reigning Southern Conference Player of the Week and probably will repeat that honor.

Lyerly shot 66-66-70 — 202 at Grandover and didn’t make a bogey until the final round. He made two on Sunday, but he also made four birdies.

He made 16 birdies in the tournament.

The event concluded UNC Greensboro’s fall season.

UNC Greensboro finished third in the team scoring.

Richmond’s Michael Childress played as an individual in the tournament and shot 73-75-75 — 223.

J.R. Smith, the long-time NBA player who competes for North Carolina A&T, drew the largest gallery and the most media attention, but shot 92-80-83 — 255 and was 97th out of 101 golfers.

HS girls tennis

Top-seeded Salisbury (17-0) is scheduled to host eighth-seeded East Surry (11-3) in the second round of the 2A dual team tennis state playoffs on Tuesday.

Other second-round matchups in the West half of the bracket are Burns (12-2) at West Stanly (13-1); Pine Lake Prep (9-1) at Shelby (14-0), and Wheatmore (12-2) at Hendersonville (14-0).

Clinton (20-0) is the top seed on the East side of the bracket.

HS cross country

Regional cross country meets will be held on Saturday, Oct. 30.

The 3A Midwest Regional at Salisbury Community Park will include runners from South Rowan, Carson, East Rowan and West Rowan, as well as the other South Piedmont Conference teams, including the powerful Lake Norman Charter girls.

South Rowan’s boys will be a team to watch. The Raiders, South Piedmont Conference and Rowan County champions, will be looking to qualify their team for state competition.

Eli Julian is the team’s phenom, but South has other strong runners such as Grayson Cromer, Aaron Jones, Brooks Hubbard and Brian Hickman.

Carson’s girls, led by Camden Corley and Makayla Borst, won the Rowan County Championships, although East Rowan’s girls finished ahead of the Cougars in the SPC Championships.

A minimum of four teams will qualify at each of Saturday’s regionals for the State Championships. There probably will be more than four, as many as seven or eight, as the top 25% of the teams posting a score (at least five runners) will advance.

In addition to teams advancing, the top seven individuals not on a qualifying team will move on to state competition.

The schedule at Salisbury Community Park has the boys race set for 10 a.m. and the girls race at 10:40 a.m. Awards will be presented at 11:30 a.m.

In the 2A Midwest Regional that will be conducted at Fisher River Park in Dobson, Salisbury’s Sutton Webb will be one of the individuals to watch. Webb won the Rowan County and Central Carolina Conference Championships.

The girls will be on the course first in Dobson at 10 a.m., with the boys running at 10:45 a.m.

Gray Stone’s girls should be strong in the 1A Midwest Regional that will be held Saturday afternoon at Kernersville’s Ivey Redmon Park.

Ivey Redmon Park is also the site of all the state competition that will be held on Nov. 6.

HS volleyball

The second round of the volleyball state playoffs is set for Tuesday.

In 3A, third-seeded West Rowan hosts 14th-seeded Hickory; 25th-seeded Carson plays at ninth-seeded Ashe County, and 18th-seeded South Rowan is at second-seeded West Henderson.

In 4A, eighth-seeded Davie is home against ninth-seeded South Iredell.

HS football

Three county matchups will conclude the regular season with North Rowan at Salisbury; Carson at South Rowan, and West Rowan at East Rowan.
A.L. Brown and Concord will play the “Bell Game” in Kannapolis.

In the latest RPI rankings, Salisbury is 11th in the 2A West. North Rowan is 12th in the 1A West. West Rowan is 21st in the 3A West. Carson is 36th in the 3A West.

Davie is 22nd in the 4A West rankings. A.L. Brown is 39th.

Playoff pairings are scheduled to be released on Saturday.

HS boys soccer

Salisbury will play Gray Stone on Wednesday to finish regular season.

The Hornets (16-2) were ranked fourth in the 2A West in RPI in the most recent update, while Gray Stone (15-3) had the fourth-best RPI in the 1A West.

Playoff pairings will be announced on Thursday.

NFL
Javon Hargrave (North Rowan) was in on seven tackles for the Philadelphia Eagles in a 33-22 loss to the Las Vegas Raiders.

COLLEGE FOOTBALL
The South Atlantic Conference has three teams in the NCAA Super Region 2 Regional Football Rankings.

Wingate came in at No. 6, with Mars Hill checking in at No. 7, and Newberry earning the No. 8 spot.
•••
JaVon Lofton (West Rowan) made eight tackles for Averett in a 24-17 loss to Methodist.
•••
Devin Turner (West Rowan) made 4 tackles and knocked down a pass in St. Andrews’ 79-64 loss to Bluefield.
•••
Kortez Weeks (West Rowan) had four catches for 27 yards in Elon’s 24-10 win against New Hampshire.
•••
Jacob Young (North Rowan) had a 51-yard punt for Fayetteville State and kicked three PATs in a romp against St. Augustine’s.

College soccer

Tom Savigar scored the winning goal in overtime to lift Catawba’s men (7-5-2, 3-5-1) to a 5-4 overtime win against Lincoln Memorial.

College cross country

The Catawba men took third and the women fifth at the 2021 South Atlantic Conference Cross Country Championships. The men’s 8k and women’s 6k were held at Charlotte’s McAlpine Park.

Matthew Fowler led Catawba’s men with a fourth-place finish. He ran a time of 24:01 and earned first team All-SAC honors. Erick Ramirez-Ramos came home in 14th, running a time of 24:53 to claim second team All-SAC honors.

For the women, Raina Andrews clocked a time of 22:35 and was 15th. That time sets a new 6k record, breaking the old mark of 22:42 set by Hannah Mercer in 2019. Madison Lowery (South Rowan) took 18th place with a time of 22:38. Both ran to third team All-SAC honors.

Catawba will run at the Southeast Regional Meet on Nov. 6 which will be held at the Milliken Research Park in Spartanburg, S.C.

Wingate won the women’s and men’s team competitions.

Noah Julian (South Rowan) ran 26:37 for Lenoir-Rhyne and was 40th. Sean Incardona (East Rowan) was 45th for the Bears in 26:50.

Middle schools

Erwin’s girls basketball team beat North Rowan Middle 44-23.

Lily Kluttz scored 18 points. Jaelyn Earnhardt scored seven, and Jordan Dry added six.

Salisbury Academy

The Salisbury Academy varsity soccer team captured its fourth consecutive conference championship.

The top-seeded Jaguars (10-0-1, 8-0) defeated Tabernacle Christian School 4-0.

Abdul Eliwa scored three goals. Lucas Webb scored the first goal on an assist by Luke Fowler in the 12th minute.

Finnegan Avery made eight saves. John McCoy and Jon Pendleton led the defense.

Eliwa was voted conference MVP. Avery, McCoy and Pendleton were named to the FAMA all-conference team.

The Jaguars outscored opponents 76-2 and have won 32 straight conference matches, dating back to 2017.

LOCAL GOLF

Tyler Kepley recently had a hole-in-one on No. 12 at Warrior.

He used a 4-iron to ace the par-3, 202-yard hole.

Tinsley and Landon Merrell witnessed the feat.