Trinity's Smith takes scoring record in stride

Trinity’s Maddie Smith became the highest scorer in school history in Saturday’s championship game of the Jack Schweers Capital City Classic. (Tim Gayle)

By TIM GAYLE

Trinity coach Blake Smith knew his senior point guard and daughter Maddie was nearing a milestone, but he didn’t tell her before Saturday’s championship game in the Jack Schweers Capital City Classic.

When Maddie knocked down a pair of 3-pointers to even the score with Catholic at 6-6, play was stopped to recognize the senior as the all-time leading scorer in Trinity basketball.

“She didn’t know,” Blake Smith said. “I don’t think she liked me doing it, to be honest with you. What did you say?”

“It distracted me,” Maddie Smith said. “I missed my next shot.”

Maddie Smith went on to score 10 more points, including the game winner to beat the Knights, giving her 2,280 career points. After the game, she admitted she didn’t relish the recognition.

“I was kind of like, ‘let’s get on with the game,’” she said. “I figured I was getting close to it, so to know that I had broken it, I was happy.”

Maddie Smith crossed the 2,000-point plateau late in the 2023-24 championship season, but Blake Smith made it a point not to draw attention to the milestone to comply with his daughter’s wishes. Earlier this season, she passed Julie Harrington’s 2,170-point total and closed in on her older sister Emma Kate, who held the school record with 2,270 career points.

Maddie, always the competitor, probably enjoyed the idea of breaking her older sister’s record.

“I like that both of us are up there at the top of it,” Maddie said. “For her, for anybody to break it, she was happy it was me breaking her record. It’s kind of cool that we’re both up there.”

Early in the second quarter, she drained another 3-pointer to pass St. James’ Ava Card and take over third place in the city’s career scoring mark for girls’ basketball. She’s 388 points behind second-place Leslie Claybrook of St. James and would need to average more than 20 points in the Wildcats’ remaining games, so she likely will have to be satisfied with being Trinity’s all-time scorer.

On Saturday, she was just thankful for the final two points, a floater in the lane that gave the Wildcats a 43-42 win over the Knights.

“She broke the record today and I’ll bet you 50 percent of her points have been little left-handed floaters,” Blake Smith said. “It’s just fitting to me that she won the game on that shot.”

2,000-POINT CLUB (River Region)

2,885 -- Michelle Delongchamp, Catholic (1990)

2,668 -- Leslie Claybrook, St. James (1989)

2,280 -- Maddie Smith, Trinity (2024)

2,272 -- Ava Card, St. James (2024)

2,270 -- Emma Kate Smith, Trinity (2023)

2,253 -- Ella Jane Connell, Prattville Christian (2022)

2,170 -- Julie Harrington, Trinity (1990)

2,161 -- Chloe Johnson, Montgomery Academy (2022)

2,124 -- Kaitlyn Reyes, Prattville Christian (2019)

2,009 -- Christina Hayes, Alabama Christian (2009)

2,005 -- Carlie Ainsworth, Alabama Christian (2007)