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Page B2 Winston-Salem Chronicle Thursday, January 7,1988 TOBACCO ROAD CLASSIC North Forsyth fast break avenges early- season loss, stopping Mount Tabor, 61-47 By RANDY PETTITT Chronicle Sports Editor North Forsyth's girls basketball team continued it's assault on the Central Piedmont Conference by hammering Mount Tabor 67-41 in the opening round of the high school portion of the Tobacco Road Classic at Wake Forest University. In the other first round game, Starmount jumped on Reynolds from the outset and never looked back en route to a 54-32 victory. The 7-1 Lady Rams clipped North, 59-49, in the finals of the tournament, but not before the Lady Vikings avenged an early-season loss to the Spartans. Paced by the inside tandem of \bl Crowell and Jean Canady -- both had eight points at halftime - the Lady Vikings managed to fcwge a 29-24 edge at the Is-eak. But North missed five straight shots mid-way through the third quarter and the Spartans closed the gap- Traci Clinkscale and Kim Kelly both hit jumpers to put the Spartans within striking distance, 35-31. North then traveled and Kelly hit two free throws to close to within two. Freshman Beth Kilby came through like a veteran, though, as eight points, as North advanced to the title game. Mount Tabor, led by Kelly's 14 points, Melanie Young's 13 and 12 from Traci Clink.scale, fell to 5-2 with the loss. They rebounded, however, to top Reynolds in the consolation game. "We beat them early in the year and knew we could play ball with them. I thought we didn't play as well as we could have." - Mike Espisito Lady Spartan's Coach she canned a long jumper and a three-pointer to pul North back on lop 39-33 at the end of the third quarter. North then went on a 10-0 run and dominated behind the play of Crowell, Canady and Kilby's shoot ing from the outside. The Vikings' big center fin ished with 14 points, while Canady had 13 and Amy Cole hit 12 from the perimeter. Kilby chipped in "I thought we played very pas sively," said Mike Espisito, the head coach of the Lady Spartans. ”We beat them early in the year and we knew we could play ball with them. North has a lot of talent and is well coached. But I thought we didn't play as well as we could have." Meanwhile, Gene Malloy was happy to get a crack at the champi onship. "Val Crowell did a good job for us," said Malloy, the head coach of the Lady Vikings. "She was a little tense at first, but she settled down and did the job. Our guards were a little off -- they weren't able to get the ball inside like she wanted. Val got a little frustrated, but she still had a good performance." The Lady Vikings suffered a setback, though, when they lost the services of forward Tina Banner. Banner twisted her knee in the Vikings' first game of the season with Reynolds and reinjured it in the first half. "This isn't the same team with out Tina," said Malloy. "It'll set us back quite a bit." Malloy was ecstatic about finally getting a holiday tournament for girls in Forsyth County. "This could turn out to be a big thing," said Malloy. "We're real pleased to gel in on it from the beginning. We'd like to see this thing turn into an equivalent of a Frank Spencer Classic for girls." Melanie Young of Mount Tabor shoots over North's Shannon Beilin the first round of the Tobacco Road Classic (photo by Randy Pettitt] Lady Deacons defeat N.C. A&T for Tobacco Road title From Page B1 Marist in their opening-round con test, but prevailed in the second half. The Red Foxes from Pough keepsie, New York, dueled head-to- head with the Lady Aggies in the first half, trailing only 36-34. But A&T head coach Tim Abney has his team turn things up a notch to take advantage of their superior speed. Led by key baskets from for wards Diedra Cheeks and Karon Williams, the Aggies took advan tage of some Marist miscues and went from a 38-38 Ue to a 60-45 lead. A&T had quietly outscored the Red Foxes 22-7 during the lengthy stretch and secured the win despite shooting only 53% of their free throws in the closing minutes. "The biggest thing was that we responded when we had to,” said Abney of his Aggies. "That was the thing I was most pleased with. Vfe did a lot of things wrong, but we were patient and won the game. "We hadn't played since December 8 and I was concerned we might stumble coming out of the gate. But we didn't and that was important. 'We needed a decent start to keep our confidence level up. Had we not gotten off to a good start, then we might’ve blamed it on the layoff and sort of backed off." The Aggies were led by an 18- point performance from Cheeks, while Williams and teammate Sheila Rivers added 13 each. Jacalyn O'Neil led Marist with 12 points. She was the only player in double figures for the Red Foxes, who fell to 2-6 with the loss. But Marist came back to out last Delaware State, 82-81, in over time to capture the consolation game and head back to New York with a 3-6 mark. In the championship game, \\bke duked it out with the Aggies early in the game before pulling away. The 10-0 Deacons held a 37- 27 lead at the half and came out of the dressing room on fire. Wyce held A&T scoreless for nearly the first three minutes of the second half and stretched their mar gin to 47-27 with 17 minutes left in the game. Despite an 18-point perfor mance from Cheeks, the Aggies could never crawl back into the contest Williams added 11 in the loss, while teammate Kim Broad nax finished with 10 points. Meanwhile, the Deacons, paced by 13 points from Neal and Dodd, remained unbeaten. Edwards added 12 points in the win, giving Wake a clean sweep in their only encounter this season with MEAC competition. 'We had respect for both these teams,” said Sanchez. "Both of them had some good athletes. I was impressed with the play of Cheeks. She is a good solid playCf. I also liked their guard (Sheila Rivers) quite a bit loo." For Abney, it was a chance to gauge his up-and-coming program. "I was looking forward to play ing Wake," said Abney. "We will play Delaware State twice in the (MEAC) conference anyway, so I wanted a shot at them. 'We've never played an ACC school before and this was a good gauge to see if we're doing the things that it will take for our pro gram to be successful. "I thought we showed some enthusiasm during the first half and played them fairly lough. We missed a lot of shots in the second half and made some mistakes we shouldn't have. Still, it was good experience to play an ACC team." Sanchez said A&T was invited to perhaps develop a friendly rival ry with their nearby neighbcff. 'We thought it would be nice to play them since they are in our own back yard," he said. "I thought they had an excellent club. They have a very quick team and we respected their team speed." A&T is expected to be amoii the second echelon of the MEA this year, but Abney is optimistic. 'You have to look at Howa South Carolina State and Bethui Cookmai as the favorites," he sa "After those three, who knows? 'We haven't proven ourseh as erne of the top teams yet, but i hope maybe we can sneak in tlie if we play well.” The Deacons are much in tl same boat. Sanchez lost Wake's all-iir leading scorer, Amy Privette, graduation this seawn. But a a of promising recruits paints an op mistic picture over the Deaci campus. "We are in a tough league said Sanchez of the Atlantic Coa Conference. "You have Virgini Please see page B5
Winston-Salem Chronicle (Winston-Salem, N.C.)
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