Game 37, Championship – Marist School 42, Webb School 39

(Game 37, Championship)

Marist School 42, Webb School 39

Marist School of Atlanta is now back-to-back champions of the Andrew Johnson Bank Ladies Classic after squeezing past Webb School of Knoxville 42-39, and the tournament has a new scoring champion in Kate Harpring.

The Eagles had their hands full with the Spartans, and it took a last couple of minutes of suspense on the playing floor to get the job done.

Harpring finished the night with 21 points, not many points compared with her previous outings this week, but it was enough to move her past Katie Smrcka-Duffy in the record books as the top individual scorer in a tournament, which is in its 35^th year. Smrcka-Duffy, from James Madison, Va., set the record of 136 points in the 1994 event. Harpring now sits in first place with 139 points after her performance this week.

Marist trailed 36-33 early in the final period, but Harpring hit a jumper from the lane to get the Eagles up by 37-36, then got her final points on a bucket to give her team a 39-36 lead. Webb just couldn’t get back even, although the Hal Henard crowd held it’s breath when, down 42-38 in the closing seconds, a whistle blew on a 3-point shot by Webb’s Cailyn Taylor. The shot rimmed out, but had it fallen, Taylor would have had a chance for a four-point play to tie the score. Taylor went on to make 1-of-3 on the three free throws with 1.5 seconds on the clock.

Harpring had 17 rebounds to go along with her 21 points and she had three assists and three steals. Katie Elder scored nine.

The Spartans got 11 points from Taylor and 10 points from Meeyah Green.

MARIST (Ga.) (42): Elder 3-8 2-4 9, Smith 1-3 0-0 3, Prophater 1-2 3-5 5, Kate Harpring 9-24 2-4 21, Morrison 0-1 0-0 0, Wilder 1-1 0-0 2, Shell 0-2 2-2 2. TOTALS: 15-41 9-15 42.

WEBB (39): Ladd 1-4 1-2 4, Rockett 2-5 0-2 5, Lowery 1-2 -0 3, Napier 0-3 0-0 0, Cailyn Taylor 4-7 1-3 11, A.Green 0-2 0-0 0, Meeyah Green 4-10 0-0 10, Mays 3-12 0-0 6. TOTALS: 15-45 2-7 39.

3-Point Goals: MS—3 (Elder, Smith, Harpring). KW—7 (Taylor 2, M.Green 2, Ladd, Rockett).