Westhampton's Isabelle Smith Is Named ACC Freshman Of The Year

The COVID-19 pandemic took a lot away from Isabelle Smith — a chance at winning a Long Island Championship with the Westhampton Beach girls basketball team and a berth into the New York State Final Four, her entire senior lacrosse season, a normal graduation — and when she contracted the virus last fall, she missed her first week of the fall women’s lacrosse season at Boston College.

As Smith herself put it, like for so many other people across the globe, it hasn’t been an easy year. But as she typically does, Smith didn’t harp on the negatives, and instead put her head down and went to work with her new team and teammates at BC.

The result was being named Atlantic Coast Conference Freshman of the Year, which was announced by one of the most competitive conferences in the country on May 5. Smith, a Westhampton resident, has totaled 51 points, leading all ACC freshmen with 39 goals. She also had 12 assists, won 11 draws, scooped up eight ground balls and caused four turnovers. She’s tallied at least one point in every game this season and amassed seven hat tricks.

Smith said that earning the distinction in such a competitive conference is an honor and something she’s certainly proud of.

“Every player in the ACC is so competitive that even if you think you’re playing at your best, there is always someone right there next to you. So I think to have any honor in the ACC, it’s such a great feeling,” she said.

Smith said that having not played any competitive lacrosse for well over a year — since her junior year in high school — before heading to BC certainly had an effect on her game when she was finally able to get back on the field about a week or so into the fall collegiate season. Her time on the U.S. U19 team, where she won a gold medal at the World Lacrosse Women’s U19 World Championships in August 2019, definitely helped her adjust to the college game.

“Yes, there is a jump in skill, but there’s also a jump in size, speed, IQ, so the summer going into my freshman year, I knew I had to make that jump, not only in my skill set but how I played the game mentally,” she explained. “I think just by watching other teams play and watching other college players, you learn so much before you get there. And I was able to apply what I learned from playing on the U.S. team my junior year and that team helped me so much and kind of gave me my first glimpse of what to expect in the ACC. I was able to carry what I learned from then into college.”

But having that long layoff in between certainly didn’t help.

“The first time I played in the fall I felt terrible,” she said. “I went from playing with such great players with Team USA to not having played in a year and a half and I felt really weak. It pissed me off. It was one of the first times where I felt pissed at my performance.

“I just think that all that stress that I had was shown on the field,” she added. “I’m tough on myself. The first time I stepped on the field, it wasn’t easy, but it wasn’t supposed to be easy. I don’t think I would be in the situation I am now if hadn’t had this really big challenging year.”

Just as she rewrote the record books at Westhampton Beach, Smith is already starting to do the same at BC. She currently sits third for most points and most goals in a freshman season, and is tied for third with Sarah Mannelly (2013) in assists. She currently sits four goals behind Covie Stanwick’s 2012 season for points (55) and is five goals away from Brooke Blue’s 2010 season for goals (44). Stanwick is the only other Eagle in program history to have been named ACC Freshman of the Year.

Boston College head coach Acacia Walker-Weinstein said the season that Smith is having is so remarkable it’s really hard to put into words. She said that Smith started from so far behind with all of the issues due to COVID that she had to play herself into the starting lineup, even though she was the second highest recruit in the country and had been committed to BC since her eighth-grade season.

“People don’t even know the half of it,” Walker-Weinstein said. “When a player goes through adversity, sometimes it makes them weak, but it was the exact opposite with Belle.

“Her approach to the whole year has been inspirational to me as a coach,” she continued. “She never complained about not playing as much in the beginning of the season. She focused on her teammates and inched her way into the starting lineup, and because of that approach, she is, I think, unquestionably, the best freshman in the country, and I would even take it one step further and say she’s one of the best players in the country.”

Boston College, ranked fourth in the country, lost to No. 3 Syracuse, 19-17, in the ACC semifinal on April 30. Smith scored five goals in that game, and her cousin and fellow Westhampton Beach grad and former Sag Harbor resident Hollie Schleicher, whom Walker-Weinstein calls “Heartbeat Hollie,” for being the heartbeat of the team, had six draw controls and caused a turnover.

During the NCAA Selection Show on ESPN U this past Sunday night, Smith, Schleicher and the rest of the Eagles found out that they were ranked fourth in the upcoming NCAA Women’s Lacrosse Tournament. The high seed allows BC to host the first two rounds, which are this Friday and Sunday. The Eagles will take on Fairfield in their opening game on Friday at 1 p.m.

It’s the eighth-straight season BC has reached the NCAA Tournament, and it has reached the national championship the past three seasons. With Smith now in tow, the goal is to finally get over the hump and win the program’s first ever national title, which would put an exclamation point on what has been a tough year overall for Smith.

“The campus is not nearly full with all of the restrictions, so I may not have gotten that typical freshman year, but I’m just grateful to have some of the greatest support,” she said. “I have the greatest teammates and coaches in the world. All of us freshmen were taken in by upperclassmen so well, and I think just our freshmen class — there’s 11 of us — I feel like I’ve known them forever. We’ve all been through a lot together, but I think that’s all made it easier playing together and getting trough this difficult time. Even though school itself was very different than it should be, I know I did it with the right people and I’m excited for the rest of the season and to see what we can accomplish.”