By Mike London
mike.london@salisburypost.com

MOUNT ULLA — West Rowan’s girls basketball team has been chasing Asheville’s A.C. Reynolds High for a long time in the RPI rankings.

West Rowan, seeded second, and A.C. Reynolds, seeded first, will finally square off today at 2 p.m. at Winston-Salem’s Joel Coliseum in the 3A West Regional final.

While the Reynolds Rockets (27-1) are the higher seed, based on RPI, which treats all wins the same, whether they’re by 50 points or by one point, West Rowan (29-1) is favored by the Massey Ratings, a power-rating system that takes game scores into consideration. West is favored by 7.5 points and given a 69 percent win probability.

A.C. Reynolds, an Asheville school, was classified as 4A by the NCHSAA at the the most recent realignment, but was the smallest 4A public school and immediately appealed that assignment. A.C. Reynolds was permitted to move down to 3A for this school year, in a mid-alignment switch.

A.C. Reynolds did not have to change leagues when it shifted from 4A to 3A. The Rockets continued to play in the split 3A/4A Mountain Conference that includes three 4A schools — Asheville, McFowell and TC Roberson.

A.C. Reynolds made its appeal to drop to 3A mostly because of individual sports such as cross country, track and swimming where it was going to be challenged to compete with 4A times, but the Rockets generally do quite well in team sports. Their girls basketball team was 22-5 in 2021-22 and 22-8 in 2022-23, reaching the third round of the 4A playoffs, before moving down.

On Dec. 2, A.C. Reynolds lost 57-48 to 4A Lake Norman. Three days later, Lake Norman won 77-73 against West Rowan.

Neither A.C. Reynolds nor West Rowan has lost since then.

A.C. Reynolds doesn’t have anyone with a huge scoring average.

All-Region guards Peyton Harvey (13.2) and Julie Janus (10.7) are team leaders.

Freshman Tait Harvey (11.8) — no relation to Peyton — is the third double-figure scorer for the Rockets. The youngster was huge in Friday’s overtime win against Ben Smith. The Rockets were down four in the overtime, with two minutes left, but pulled it out.

The Rockets have a team-oriented approach that has enabled to beat some good, athletic teams in the playoffs such as Dudley and Ben Smith.

West, coached by Ashley Poole, also doesn’t have a huge scorer.

Mars Hill recruit Lauren Arnold, an all-region player, leads the Falcons with 16.5 points per game and led the way with 18 in the fourth round.

Emma Clarke averages 13.5. Tiara Thompson, Mya Edwards and De’Mya Phifer also average double figures. Makaylah Tenor averages about 7 points per game, and Lydia Wilson came off the bench, with two Falcons fouled out, and helped win the fourth-round game against East Lincoln with five points.