How did Trump win over most of the South in the 2016 Republican primary?

[Orser67]

The key to Trump's success was his ability to harness a)racialized economic anxiety (basically, the idea that "non-whites/immigrants are taking our jobs/government benefits", and b)cultural grievance (the idea that liberal elites and their allies are changing American culture in unwelcome ways). Both of these themes played particularly well in the South.

What's interesting is that the South was probably his strongest area in the primaries. He did win NH and NV, but during the first half of March he won 10/13 Southern primaries; the ones he lost were Texas (Cruz's home state), OK (which sits at the border of the South, West, and Midwest) and D.C. During that same time period, he won just 6/13 non-Southern primaries (excluding territories). He clinched the nomination primarily through his dominance in the Acela primaries (plus a win in Indiana), but I wonder if he would have still won the nomination if Southern states hadn't made up a disproportionate share of the early primaries.