It was a bittersweet Senior Day for Kayla Lewis.
Florida’s regular-season finale against Georgia on Sunday marked the last time Lewis played on the O’Connell Center floor.
The Gators honored their lone senior — accompanied by her parents, brother and aunt — following the game, but not before UF fell 52-45 to UGA to close out Southeastern Conference play with a 5-11 record.
“Obviously we’re terribly disappointed with the outcome,” UF coach Amanda Butler said. “You’ve got to give Georgia a lot of credit for what they’ve experienced in the past couple weeks and coming in and playing with great fight and great consistency. It’s really hard to put your finger on one thing. It seemed like we had a really tough time finishing.”
After taking a 9-3 lead early, Florida (13-16, 5-11 SEC) fell into one of its shooting slump that have almost become routine this season, shooting 22.2 percent from the field in the first 20 minutes to go into the half down 28-19.
The Bulldogs (18-11, 6-10 SEC) extended their lead to as much as 12 (37-25) in the second half before Florida went on a dashing 18-4 run over the course of 7:35 to take a 43-41 lead with just more than six minutes to play.
Redshirt junior guard Cassie Peoples scored all seven of her team-leading 13 points and dishing out three assists in the process.
But unlike UF’s last meeting against UGA — one where the Gators defeated the Bulldogs 51-48 on the road by scoring 13 unanswered points to close out the game — the lead didn’t last.
Georgia closed out the game’s final 5:14 on an 11-2 run, making three free throws in the final 17 seconds to ice the game.
“We played a lot more zone than maybe we had wanted to in certain segments and couldn’t give them second chances,” Butler said. “It didn’t feel like they were scoring as much on the first chances, but the second chances, they were making us pay.”
In her final game in the O’Connell Center, Lewis scored 6 points on 3-of-4 shooting and brought down three rebounds.
While Lewis didn’t put up career-setting numbers in her final home game, her career ended on a strong note.
Lewis finished the regular season with a team-high 6.5 rebounds per game to go with 9.1 points per contest.
After an injury-plagued start to her year — missing 19 games in her freshman year and then earning a medical redshirt for her second year — Lewis became a leader on and off the court during her final three seasons.
In her career, she posted 50 double-figure scoring outings and 14 double-doubles.
She became the 23rd player in the program’s 41-year history to score 1,000 career points.
“I think that over the last five years, I’ve grown tremendously from the individual that I was when I came in,” Lewis said. “The lessons that you learn from your freshman year through your senior year, the growth, the experiences, the places that you get to visit, the relationships that you get to build which will transcend sport.”
Florida now has two days to prepare for the SEC Tournament. With the loss, the Gators earned the No. 12 seed and will face 13th-seed Auburn (12-17, 3-13 SEC) on Wednesday at 7 p.m. in Little Rock, Arkansas, to open the tournament.
“At this point, (tonight’s game is) history,” Butler said, “and we’ve got to turn the page and we’ve got to go with the best versions of ourselves, which we did not bring tonight, to Little Rock and try to do something special.”
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Kayla Lewis drives into the paint during Florida's 52-45 loss to Georgia on Sunday in the O'Connell Center.
