Westwood girls fall in title game

MACON — The storybook ending that the Westwood girls basketball team started ended with a missing chapter.

The Lady Wildcats fell to Gatewood 44-36 Saturday night in the Georgia Independent Schools Association Class AAA championship game at Mercer University’s Hawkins Arena.

It was Westwood’s first loss of the season and the last game for head coach Jenni Smith, who made the decision to step down to spend more time with her family.

“We were thrilled to be here,” she said. “This team has had a fantastic run. We’ve been blessed in so many ways. They had a perfect season until the last three minutes of that ball game.”

The teams were tied four separate times with under five minutes left. After being tied at 36, the game started to slip away.

The big blow came when Gatewood’s Brenlyn Harris hit a layup and was fouled. She hit the free throw to give the Lady Gators a 41-36 lead with just 51 seconds left.

Westwood failed to score for the rest of the game.

“Late in the fourth they started to double Callie (Smith),” Jenni Smith said. “They face guarded her and we had a hard time just getting our offense started. I felt like we had an advantage at times in the post with Karlie (Jones), but we had a hard time getting the ball to her.”

Despite playing on an ankle that was injured in Friday night’s win over The Heritage School, Callie Smith led the Lady Wildcats with 13 points. She scored eight in the first half, including two free throws that gave Westwood a lead with over a minute left in the second quarter.

The lead quickly evaporated, but Westwood trailed by just one at halftime.

Karlie Jones and Callie Smith helped the Lady Wildcats build their biggest lead of the game in the third quarter. The two combined for six straight points to give their team a 27-22 lead.

At times, the Westwood offense went cold as ice. The Lady Wildcats failed to score for the final five minutes of the first and went through multiple droughts that lasted more than two minutes.

This was only the sixth time in four years that Westwood has lost a game.

“These kids don’t really know how to lose,” Jenni Smith said. “At the end of the day, we told them they learned a lot about being great teammates. This has been a great team. They truly embrace what we say at every game.”

For Jenni Smith, who coaches alongside her husband Tim, the decision to step down was something she had thought about for a while. Her daughter, Callie, is a senior and Saturday was her last game.

“My oldest daughter is in college playing tennis and I’ve missed a lot of that,” Jenni Smith said. “Callie will graduate this year and she is going to be in college. I hope she gets to play in college. Whether she does or she doesn’t, when it is Thanksgiving break and my girls are home, I want to be with them.”

Jenni Smith’s teams won state titles in 2013 and ‘14 and she coached runner-up teams in the three other seasons.

Haley Marshall scored nine points for Westwood, all in the first half, while Jones added eight in the game.

Harris finished with a game-high 15 points.