Thursday, Feb. 02, 2012

Gaffney passes Broughton’s Clayton in all-time scoring

Green Hope senior Kristen Gaffney passed former Broughton standout Karen Clayton as Wake County’s most prolific girls’ public school basketball scorer on Wednesday night in a 75-46 win over Wilson Hunt. Gaffney has 2,369 points in her career.

Gaffney made a layup with 2:41 left in the first, and the game was stopped. Green Hope athletic director Wayne Bragg said the game ball will be retired. Gaffney scored a season-high 37 points in the victory. Clayton scored 2,343 points from 1989-92.

Gaffney thanked her teammates after the win.

“I wouldn’t have been able to do it without them by my side,” Gaffney said. “It’s a great thing for me and I was thanking them in the locker room when they were congratulating me. ... It’s just been a tremendous four years for me and I couldn’t ask for a better team and teammates.”

Gaffney averages 26.6 points per game this season, and the Falcons (17-2) have five games left in the regular season.

Gaffney is 11th all-time in scoring in North Carolina during the modern girls basketball era, but is about 900 points behind the all-time N.C. High School Athletic Association record of 3,225 points by Danyel Parker of Clinton High.

But as far as productivity, no one in North Carolina can touch Molly Colvard Gambill of Jefferson Nathan’s Creek (1953- 56), who scored 5,048 points during an era when girls used six players. Girls were limited to two, later three, dribbles. Most players played at one end of the court or the other, although a limited number of rovers was eventually permitted.

The 5-foot-10 Gambill averaged 65 points per game during her senior year in 1956. She made 39 of 40 shots from the field in one game and scored 92 points in another.

But Gambill’s 92 points in a game isn’t the state record. Melba Overcash of Landis in 1949, Martha Ann Bowers of Norlina in 1955 and Beulah Thompson of New Hope in 1954 each scored 107 points in a game.

Kay Wilson Hammer of Taylorsville, who scored 4,210 points in her career, probably could have broken the single-game record in 1963, but came out of a game with three minutes left after scoring 104 points against Marion.

Taylorsville coach Pat Gainey, who sometimes had 45 players on his teams, had decided to let the 5-foot-11 Wilson go for the record, but he thought the record was 102 points.

“I’ve always regretted that,” Gainey said in an interview in 1989. “I wanted her to get the record, but I wanted to get some other players in, too.”

Cheryl Miller of Riverside (Calif.) Poly High holds the national modern high school girls record with 105 points in a game, but 6-foot-5 Lisa Leslie of Inglewood (Calif.) Morningside probably would have beaten the single game mark if she had played in the second half of a game against Torrance (Calif.) South Torrance in 1990.

Leslie scored 101 points in the first half of the game, which was stopped when South Torrance refused to continue play after halftime.

J. Mike Blake contributed to this story.