Staff report

LANDIS — South Rowan’s girls basketball team was on wrong end of a running-clock South Piedmont Conference opener on Friday.

Northwest Cabarrus was older, bigger, quicker and deeper and won easily 70-23.

South made only five field goals, including three amazing ones by Ella Morgan, who was clobbered on all three. Hannah Atwell had the other two field goals for the Raiders (1-2, 0-1). Avery Fisher, Dabrianna Pharr, Kynlee Dextraze and Ari Alston got in the scorebook with free throws.

Atwell scored the game’s first bucket, but Northwest Cabarrus’ backcourt pressure was ferocious, the Raiders fell behind 12-2, and South coach Alex Allen had to use her first timeout to try to calm things down.

Morgan, a sophomore point guard, was able to get things settled down temporarily, and the Raiders were still in the game, down 19-10, after a quarter.

But the second quarter was an avalanche of Northwest buckets. Mackenzie Ortscheid scored with a Euro-step and made a tough shot as she banged her head on the court. Quick-handed guard Re’ale Walton was all over the place.

Northwest (3-1, 1-0) scored 34 in the second quarter while holding South without a field goal, and it was 53-15 at halftime.

“We got rushed and they sped us up,” Allen said. “We forced passes and couldn’t settle and control the pace.”

When Kennedy Hilsenroth backed down a Raider to score point-blank early in the second half, the visitors led by 40, and it was running-clock time. The game had been loosely officiated, and it got looser.

“Learning experience,” Allen said. “We had our bright spots with Ella attacking. Dabrianna was aggressive. Ari had some good blocks.”

Northwest suffered a 45-37 loss on Saturday against 4A Hickory Ridge, but the Trojans may be one of the top challengers to West Rowan in the SPC.

NW Cabarrus    19    34    10   7   — 70

South Rowan    10      5      3    5   — 23

NWC — Walton 17, Ortscheid 16, Hilsenroth 9, Bell 6, Furner 5, Ay. Moore 5, Al. Moore 5, Alberico 5, Smith-Rogers 2.

SOUTH — Morgan 8, Atwell 5, Fisher 4, Pharr 3, Dextraze 2, Alston 1.