Smith is Worth the Wait for Cavaliers

By Jeff White (jwhite@virginia.edu)
VirginiaSports.com

CHARLOTTESVILLE, Va. — For the first five weeks of the season Sa’Myah Smith, recovering from minor knee surgery, sat and watched her new team play the game she loves. Her long-awaited 2025-26 debut finally came Sunday afternoon, and Smith contributed 12 points and four rebounds in about 15 minutes off the bench in Virginia’s 81-55 rout of ACC foe Boston College.

“She was out there balling,” teammate Romi Levy said.

Sunday’s game, though, was in Chestnut Hill, Mass. Not until Wednesday night did Smith have an opportunity to play in front of Cavalier fans at John Paul Jones Arena.

“I was super nervous, I’m not gonna lie,” she said with a smile afterward.

If so, it wasn’t apparent in her performance. Smith, a 6-foot-2 power forward from Texarkana, Texas, scored 12 points, on 5-for-5 shooting, in the first five minutes against Howard. She finished with 18 points and eight rebounds—both game highs—in UVA’s 76-50 win over the Bison.

No. 5 might have felt some jitters in her JPJ debut, “but when you have your coach’s confidence and your team’s confidence, you just play,” Smith said.

Of the eight players who joined head coach Amaka Agugua-Hamilton’s program this year, Smith arrived with the most impressive credentials. She transferred to UVA after three seasons at LSU, one of the nation’s top programs.

In 2022-23, Smith made the SEC’s All-Freshman team and helped LSU win the NCAA championship. She missed most of the next season with a serious knee injury but returned to start 28 games in 2024-25.

In the NCAA tournament last spring, Smith totaled 20 points, 12 rebounds and six assists in a second-round over Florida State, and she had 21 points and 11 boards in a Sweet Sixteen victory over NC State.

Now that Smith has been cleared to play, Agugua-Hamilton is able to move the 6-foot-3 Levy, who’d been starting at power forward, back to her more natural position on the wing.

Levy, who finished with nine points, seven assists, six rebounds, two steals and two blocked shots against Howard (7-4), said she’s still getting used to play on the perimeter again. But wherever Agugua-Hamilton “puts me, I’ll be there,” said Levy, a graduate transfer from South Florida. “I’ll produce. I’ll be there for my teammates, so it really doesn’t matter.”

The Wahoos’ starting center is 6-foot-4 Tabitha Amanze, whose backup is 6-foot-4 Caitlin Weimar. UVA’s frontcourt reserves include 6-foot-5 Adeang Ring. Amanze contributed 13 points and five rebounds against Howard, and Ring had eight points, five rebounds and two blocks.

“Honestly, we’re huge with that lineup,” Agugua-Hamilton said.

The Hoos (8-3) pounced on the Bison immediately Wednesday night. Virginia led 31-13 after one quarter and 48-26 at the half. The Cavaliers’ concentration lapsed at times in the second half, but the outcome was never in doubt.

“We were definitely the aggressors,” said Agugua-Hamilton, who’s in her fourth season at UVA.

The Cavaliers head into the exam break with a solid NET rating of 31. Their first loss was to UMBC, which is 4-6 this season, but the other two defeats were to Nebraska and Vanderbilt, which are unbeaten and ranked Nos. 14 and 24, respectively, in the latest Associated Press poll.

In the ACC/SEC Challenge, UVA faded in the second and third quarters and fell 81-68 to Vanderbilt in Nashville, Tenn. The Cavaliers bounced back from that defeat to batter BC in their ACC opener, and they dominated again Wednesday night.

“I think our players were really locked in and have been locked in, particularly since the Vandy loss,” Agugua-Hamilton said. “I think that we just have a different focus about us.”

Six Cavaliers scored eight points or more Wednesday night: Smith, Amanze, Levy, Ring and guards Paris Clark and Kymora Johnson. Like Levy, Johnson also had seven assists and six rebounds.

Smith played 31 minutes and showed no ill effects from her injury. She arrived on Grounds and began training with the Cavaliers’ coaches late last spring. Her operation this fall was a setback, “but I’ve had way worse injuries,” Smith said, and so she wasn’t fazed by her rehab.

Another UVA forward, sophomore Breona Hurd, has missed the past seven games with an injury but is progressing well in her recovery, Agugua-Hamilton said. The Cavaliers will be without junior guard Olivia McGhee, however, for the rest of the season.

McGhee, who’s played in only four games this season, underwent ankle surgery Monday.

“She’s had a bunch of ankle problems since she’s been here,” Agugua-Hamilton said. “I think it started her freshman year, to be honest, and she’s played through a lot of them and tried to be resilient, but it just got to the point where she had to get something done.”

The Hoos don’t play again until Dec. 20, when Winthrop visits John Paul Jones Arena for a noon game. Virginia returns to ACC play Dec. 29 against SMU, also at JPJ.

“During this week, we can get some time to recover,” Agugua-Hamilton said. “We’ve had a lot of games, some travel, things like that, so recovery is big, but then also working [out] individually. So we’ll do some individual workouts, work on skill sets, things like that. And then team practices, of course, just to stay ready.”

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