Spring Hill girls use team effort to knock off Carver in middle school rivalry game

LAURINBURG — Spring Hill first-year girls basketball coach KaShaelyn Fuselier has a saying for how she wants her team to play: “We over me.”

“We always put the team first before just one single person,” Fuselier said. “We’re family; we’re a team. It’s we over me.”

Her team’s effort, which included five players scoring, resulted in a 30-20 win for the Spartans, who led wire-to-wire over their in-county middle school rival, the Carver Eagles, on Monday in a game held at Scotland High School.

“We just put all our feelings about Carver, put all our feelings to the side, and just played our game the whole time,” Fuselier said. “We were all nervous, including me, because this is a big gym compared to what we’re used to playing (in). So, I was like, y’all know what? Just pretend that no one’s in the crowd. Even though you hear yelling, that’s just your ears ringing. Just pretend like no one’s there, and you just play your game like you play in practice.”

Dere’yanna Vanderhall scored 12 points, including eight in the first half, for Spring Hill (3-4). Amaria Bostick had eight, Neveah Lewis scored four and Haydynn Lowery and Journee Seals had two each.

“I was nervous at first,” Vanderhall said. “I was trying to lock in, but I was just trying to keep my head in the game. I was playing like I knew I could play; getting to the basket, trying to keep Khloe (Radford) locked down because she’s a good player, keeping the good defense, trying not to get in foul trouble and just staying focused in the game. Do what I know I can do best.”

Vanderhall’s two free throws in the sixth minute of the first quarter gave the Spartans a 3-0 lead. Following a basket from Seals, Vanderhall made a layup before Radford scored the final three points of the period for a 7-3 score.

Carver (3-4) came to within two points of tying it after Radford’s layup made it 7-5, but a 13-0 run closed the half for Spring Hill, which led 20-5.

“I told the girls to pretend that the score was flipped, that we were down and they were up, and we had to keep fighting to the end of the game,” Fuselier told her team at halftime. “I don’t care if the score was 100-0 and they had 100; we’re going to keep fighting. Or if we had 100 and they had zero, we would flip scores. I don’t care; we’re going to keep fighting.”

The Spartans held a 24-5 advantage in the third minute of the second half, but Nora Teasley hit back-to-back layups to spark a 9-0 spurt for Carver that ended the third quarter with a 24-14 score.

“The whole mentality was stay focused,” Vanderhall said. “We just worked hard. We know what we can do; we know what we can’t do. And we just ran our plays our coach told us. We stayed focused. And even at the half, when we were up (15 points), we had the mindset like we were down 20. So when we go out, we’re still winning and (not letting) them catch a lead, and we can still keep the same focus.”

With Radford struggling to get the ball down the floor while being triple-teamed, Carver couldn’t generate enough offense in the fourth to come back, with both teams finishing the stanza with six points.

“The defense is key,” Vanderhall said. “Offense don’t win games … defense is what’s the key. If you can keep good defense, you can win any game. It don’t matter if you put points up or not; you’ve got to keep that good defense. And so in the second half, we just kept (the) defense locked down. We locked in when we came in for the second half, and I just thank God we took the dub (win).”

Radford finished with 11 points, Teasley had eight and Jade Clark had one for the Eagles.

With the Spartans’ win, they now have an opportunity to make the Southeastern Middle School Athletic Conference playoffs with a win in Thursday’s regular-season finale against Rockingham, or a Carver loss at West Hoke or an East Hoke loss to Cordova. Carver is in, however, with a win and either a Spring Hill loss or an East Hoke loss.