GREENSBORO - Republican Party leaders elected former Charlotte teacher and longtime party officer Linda Daves as their state chairman Saturday, rebuffing calls for an overhaul of the party's top ranks after election defeats last month.

Daves' victory was also a rejection of a proposal by several Republican officials, including the state's U.S. senators, to postpone the election in hopes of recruiting another candidate.

The vote means that the GOP will start toward the 2008 elections with much of the same leadership team, but Daves likely will come under increased scrutiny between now and another chairman's election in May.

Daves (pronounced Dave's), a former state vice chairwoman and Mecklenburg County chairwoman, defeated two challengers Saturday, including a sitting state senator, by a big enough margin to avoid a runoff. She needed a majority of the more than 280 party executive committee members at the Greensboro meeting to win on the first ballot.

"It's a pretty strong message," Daves said afterward. "I don't want to be presumptuous, but it's a mandate to serve."

Party officials would not release the numbers in the vote, but one candidate, Guilford County Chairman Marcus Kindley, said he was three votes shy of forcing a runoff with Daves.

"It didn't get slam-dunked," Kindley said. "I'm probably going to run in May."

The election Saturday was to fill the last five months of former Chairman Ferrell Blount's term. He announced his intention to resign on Election Day, as Republicans lost a congressional seat and seven seats in the General Assembly.

Rep. Ed McMahan of Charlotte, an officer with the national Republican Party, said state GOP leaders don't blame Daves for a national election trend against Republicans that carried into North Carolina.

"They realize it was sort of beyond our control this time," McMahan said after the vote.

GOP leaders will elect a chairman to a new, two-year term in May. That is when allies of U.S. Sen. Elizabeth Dole and U.S. Sen. Richard Burr say they aim to have a new candidate. Dole, Burr and other Republican elected officials want to boost the party's fundraising power and restore what they see as a weakened relationship with the state's business community.

Daves said she is looking at what needs to be done to gear up for the 2008 election, such as raising money and recruiting candidates, not her own re-election chances.

"I'm not looking at this job in terms of the next six months," she said.

Democrats routinely outspend Republicans in statewide races. Part of that is because Democrats control the governor's office and majorities in both the state House and Senate. Political contributions typically trend toward those in power.

Some Republicans, however, have grown frustrated that their party lags so far behind in the money race, particularly in contributions from the corporate sector, given that they consider their public policy positions to be more business-friendly.

Daves said she will focus a "tremendous amount of time" on fundraising and said she has more experience at it than some party members might realize.

"Raising money is like recruiting candidates," she said. "You don't see the fingerprints unless somebody wants you to."