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By Jay Spivey

For the Clemmons Courier

The West Forsyth girls lacrosse team breezed to the Central Piedmont 4-A tournament championship with two wins.

West Forsyth went in as the regular-season champion and No. 1 seed for the conference tournament with a first-round bye. It defeated Davie County in the semifinals and Reagan in the championship.  

In the championship last Thursday night at the Bolton Soccer Complex against Reagan, Tatum Snow scored seven goals to help West Forsyth win 22-7. 

“The girls came out strong for sure,” Titans Coach Doug Brawley said. “Having played them twice we had a good idea of what they were bringing to the game. And we came up with a gameplan that just worked to the T.”

The Titans (20-5) led 11-3 at halftime.

“We were able to double that. I think they scored two of their goals in the last two minutes of the game. So, really it wasn’t even that close.”

The championship game was moved up because of the threat of bad weather. It finished just before the weather came. The boys championship wasn’t completed.  

“It meant a lot to the girls,” Brawley said. “They wanted to solidify, because Reagan was still trying to tell us how hard it is to beat a team three times. Maybe that’s true, but (last Thursday) night we proved that was not the case.” 

Reagan fell to 16-6.  

In the semifinals last Tuesday at Bolton, West Forsyth routed Davie County 21-8 with the help of four goals each by Isabel Gil and Gabby Vestal. 

“It was a fun game and good sportsmanship between both teams,” Brawley said. “And just a good practice game for both teams getting ready for the state tournament.” 

The War Eagles fell to 10-9. 

The NCHSAA released the pairings last Friday for the Class 4-A girls lacrosse tournament. West Forsyth, as the No. 1 seed from the Central Piedmont 4-A, received the No. 5 overall seed in the West and received a first-round bye. It will play at home on Thursday against the winner of No. 21 Indian Trail Porter Ridge (7-9) at No. 12 Greensboro Grimsley (10-6).  

“I don’t know anything about either of those teams other than looking at their schedule,” Brawley said. “We’ll have to try to do some scouting, watch some film, see if we can come up with a gameplan for them. But I feel like we should have a good opportunity to advance if we bring our ‘A’ game.” 

Baseball 

The No. 5-seeded West Forsyth baseball team survived and advanced through the first two rounds of the state playoffs last week by edging No. 28 Charlotte Ardrey Kell last Tuesday and slipping by No. 12 Reagan on Friday night.  

West Forsyth (22-4) defeated Ardrey Kell 4-3 in 10 innings and defeated Reagan 5-4.  

“I’m still trying to figure some of it out, I guess” West Forsyth Coach Kevin McIntosh said. “Tuesday night, a 10 inning ballgame, was very emotional and very exciting only to be topped off by something better. Capped off Friday night with a walk-off win again against a rival school. This really caps it all off, and it just made for a super-exciting week.” 

Ardrey Kell (16-11) scored two runs in the top of the fourth last Tuesday in Clemmons to take a 3-1 lead. West Forsyth scored a run in the bottom of the sixth on a solo home run by Will Holden, and Landon Church hit a solo homer in the seventh inning to tie it and send it to extra innings.  

The game went to extra innings and West Forsyth scored in the bottom of the 10th when Jaxson Holloman of the Titans was walked with the bases loaded. 

“We knew what we were going to get against Reagan. With Ardrey Kell it was unknown, and we knew they were a very good ball team. But at least with Reagan we knew we were going to get a matchup, our hands were going to be tied, but we knew what we were getting,” McIntosh said. “That’s what made going into Friday night a little bit more relaxing than Tuesday night.” 

Against Reagan (22-5) in the second round in Clemmons, West Forsyth scored in the bottom of the seventh to win 4-3.

Reagan had a 13-game winning streak that dated back to when West Forsyth defeated it in the regular season.

The Titans led 3-1 after the first inning, and it was 4-2 after the second inning. The Raiders scored two runs in the top of the fifth on a two-run homer by Riley Wall.  

In the bottom of the seventh, Garrett Secrist led off with a single for the Titans. With one out, Jace Parker had a pinch-hit single. Luis Acevedo hit a single up the middle to knock in Secrist from second for the winning run. 

“It was the highs of highs and just a great way to cap it off,” McIntosh said. “And anytime you can beat a rival and beat a team as good as Reagan three times in one year that says something.” 

West Forsyth was scheduled to play host to No. 20 South Iredell (20-8) on Tuesday in the third round. South Iredell defeated No. 4 Greensboro Grimsley 3-1 last Friday, which meant that West Forsyth would play the third-round game at home. 

“Anytime we can be at home that’s a plus,” McIntosh said. “I guess by playoff technicalities it was an upset with South Iredell beating Grimsley. But they’re another 20-win team, and anytime you can win 20 games in a high school season you can’t take a team lightly.” 

Softball 

Much like with baseball, the West Forsyth softball team also won two games last week in the Class 4-A playoffs.  

No. 3 West Forsyth (25-2) upended No. 30 South Iredell last Tuesday in Clemmons and beat No. 19 South Iredell 10-7 on Friday in Clemmons. 

South Iredell (14-12) scored four runs in the top of the second inning, but West Forsyth scored 10 runs in the bottom of the third, capped off with a grand slam home run by Sydney Horton to make it 10-4. 

“That was the craziest game ever,” West Forsyth Coach Kevin Baity said.  

The Titans sent 13 batters up in the third inning, and there were 10 batters before an out was made. 

South Iredell added three runs in the top of the seventh to trim the lead to 10-7 after it hit a three-run homer. 

Last Tuesday in Clemmons, Southwest Guilford scored a run in the second to take a 1-0 lead, but West Forsyth scored three runs in the fourth, two in the fifth and two runs in the sixth to take a 7-1 lead. 

“I wasn’t satisfied,” Baity said. “We ended up winning 7-1, but we were down 1-0 going into the bottom of the fourth.” 

West Forsyth was scheduled to play No. 6 Northern Guilford in the third round of the playoffs on Tuesday in Clemmons. Northern Guilford (23-4) defeated No. 11 Waxhaw Marvin Ridge 10-8 in the second round on Friday night. 

“Just looking at the whole 4-A West in general, I truly think if we start playing our game like we were playing midseason when we peaked early, I think we can definitely beat anybody,” Baity said. 

Girls Soccer

The West Forsyth girls soccer team closed out the regular season last week and it turned out to be an up and down week. 

After having gone undefeated through the first 12 games in the conference, East Forsyth scored two goals in the second half last Monday in Clemmons to edge West Forsyth 3-2.  

“I think there’s a lot of different ways we can look at it,” Titans Coach Jeffrey Williams said. “We were up 2-0 in the game and had control of the game and had a malfunction and gave up a goal right before halftime. And then East Forsyth definitely came out in the second half and took it to us a little bit and were definitely the better team in the second half.” 

Leigha Curry and Allie Ramseur scored the two goals for West Forsyth (15-4-1, 13-1). Mylie Lockwood, Addison Bricolo and Addison Clouthier scored for East Forsyth (14-4-2, 11-2-1). 

“We learned a lot from that game and at several different positions and several different players we were actually able to improve on a couple things, especially the goalies and some stuff,” Williams said. “We learned some stuff about us and learned some stuff that we needed to improve on and I think that’s going to help us in the playoffs.”

The final game of the regular season was last Wednesday at Mount Tabor (15-4-2, 8-4-2). Curry and Reese Williams scored goals for West Forsyth to help it defeat Mount Tabor 2-0. 

“Tabor came out strong and then I think we came into the game and ran the rest of the game after the first little bit,” Williams said. “But we didn’t capitalize some opportunities, or we didn’t do some things that we wanted to, but it was good we were in a tight game and good that we fought through that and came through with that because I think that’s what the playoffs (are) all about.”

The NCHSAA released the pairings on Friday for the Class 4-A playoffs and conference champion West Forsyth was awarded the No. 5 seed in the West and scheduled to play No. 28 Southwest Guilford (14-9-1) in the first round Monday in Clemmons.

“We’re familiar with two or three of their kids that’s played with or against our kids,” Williams said. “At this point every team is a good team.” 

Boys Lacrosse

The West Forsyth boys lacrosse team played last week in the conference tournament, and it came out with a mixed bag of results. 

As the No. 4 seed from the conference, West Forsyth (12-9) faced No. 5 Mount Tabor (5-13) on Monday, May 5 in the first round in Clemmons.

Grayson Brandon scored four goals and Haegan Paschold and Cole Tisdale added three goals apiece to help West Forsyth upend Mount Tabor 15-4. 

“Going into Tabor I was a little bit nervous just because the last time we played them it was a two-goal game and we didn’t play particularly well,” West Forsyth Coach Jacob Able said. “And the week before we had one of our worst games of the season against East (Forsyth) and lost.  

“So, I was a little bit nervous going into Tabor, but they came out and that was the first time we played as well as we did in a very long time.” 

West Forsyth advanced to the semifinals Tuesday against top-seeded Reynolds (18-2) at the Bolton Soccer Complex, and Reynolds cruised to an 18-3 win. 

“We had already played (Reynolds) twice in the past, and honestly the scores have been closer than the games have been against Reynolds,” Able said. “Because usually in the first quarter, we go down six to eight goals, or something like that, and hardly touch the ball.” 

Ryder Martin, Milo Lester and Brandon scored goals for the Titans. 

“We just kind of went into that game saying we’re going to go out there and try our best,” Able said. “If we get some stops, put some balls in the net, fantastic. If it goes the way the other ones have then it’s a fantastic opportunity for us to get some work in against a really good team and work on some stuff that we need to work on.” 

The NCHSAA announced the pairings Friday for the Class 4-A boys lacrosse playoffs and West Forsyth was given the No. 14 seed. West Forsyth was scheduled to play at home on Tuesday in the first round against No. 19 Charlotte Providence (6-12). 

“They’ve got a bad record, but they’re in a really good conference,” Able said. “They’ve got some really good results against some really good teams.”