Red Devils rally

The Newton-Conover High boys basketball team absorbed an early first-half punch.

The Red Devils then delivered the second-half knockout.

The inside-outside combination of Jordan Gibbs and Dorian Shuford combined for 37 points, and Newton-Conover rallied from a 13-point first half deficit to knock Bunker Hill 57-50 Friday night at Newton-Conover.

The Red Devils up their overall mark to 5-9, but more importantly find themselves locked in a tie for second place with Bandys in the Catawba Valley Athletic 2A Conference race at 3-1. Both teams sit one game behind 4-0 West Caldwell.

Bunker Hill slips to 8-6 overall and sits with Draughn and South Iredell in the conference's third position at 2-2.

For much of the opening half, very little seemed to go right for Newton-Conover, with Nathan Sherrill's driving bucket along the baseline putting the Red Devils in an 18-5 hole with 5 minutes, 34 seconds left in the half. But from the second quarter's midway point on, hardly anything went wrong.

Newton-Conover began to find its range from beyond the arc, loosening the Bears zone defense. The Red Devils then began to find holes inside with Gibbs producing 17 of his 19 points after the first quarter.

After starting 0-for-7 from 3-point range, Newton-Conover connected on six of its final 11 tries, with Shuford (18 points) finishing 3-for-8 from long distance. The hot shooting from the perimeter allowed the Red Devils offense to find its rhythm, said Red Devils head coach Mark Carter.

"We shot relatively well from the 3-point line, and one we started making them, we got into more of a flow and I think we started playing better," said Carter. "Plus we started guarding people, getting turnovers, and we got the game more like we wanted."

Walker Mehl's 15 points paced Bunker Hill, which ended 22-of-55 (40 percent) from the floor. But while Newton-Conover discovered its 3-point touch on its way to a 21-for-55 (38.2 percent) night, the Bears never found theirs, hitting on just three of 13 attempts.

"We got off to a good start, but they started doing a good job of defending us and contesting shots," said Bunker Hill head coach Matt Wilkinson. "We're still a very young team, and we go through stretches making mistakes.

"We still have to minimize our mistakes and learn to get through those low times in a game."

Both squads had plenty of miscues in the first half, combining for 23 turnovers (Newton-Conover 12, Bunker Hill 11). The Red Devils, though, tightened up their ball control after the break, giving the ball away just four times, while the Bears added nine more turnovers.

Newton-Conover capitalized on its opportunities, using a 10-0 run out of halftime to turn a 22-17 deficit into a 27-22 lead on Shuford's transition bucket. The Red Devils ended with 16 points off 20 Bunker Hill turnovers.

"We talked about (turnovers) at halftime with a little bit of enthusiasm," Carter said. "The kids were more conscious of it in the second half.

"We talked about instead of just making a pass, make one without committing a turnover.

Newton-Conover stretched its lead to 38-26 on a Shuford 3 with 1:48 left in the third quarter before taking a 38-32 advantage into the final stanza. Cole McGraw's 3-pointer pulled the Bears within 41-37 with 5:38 remaining, but Bunker Hill got no closer, as the Red Devils put the game away at the foul line. Newton-Conover went 6-for-8 from the stripe in the final 1:30 to secure the win.

NEWTON-CONOVER 53, BUNKER HILL 21

Shynese Whitener scored 13 points, Tiana Littlejohn added 10, and Newton-Conover easily remained unbeaten in league play with the 32-point victory.

The Red Devils (11-3, 4-0) bolted out to a 15-1 first-quarter lead and used a pesky man-to-man defense to give the Bears fits from the opening tip. Newton-Conover had 29 points off 38 Bunker Hill turnovers, and 38 of the Red Devils points came in the paint. Newton-Conover had only 11 giveaways, with just four coming post-halftime.

The miscues also led to a wide disparity in shot attempts, with the Red Devils hitting on 24-of-63 attempts. Sarah Brown and Margaret Connor each scored five points to lead the Bears (2-11, 1-3), who made good on just eight of 36 tries.