COVINGTON, Ga. — On a night that was dedicated to honoring the Eastside Lady Eagles’ senior class, one senior shined the most in the biggest spotlight. 

Mehkyla White displayed her clutch gene to help Eastside earn a 66-61 win over the Jefferson Lady Dragons on Friday night.  

As the clock was ticking under 20 seconds left, Jailyn Williams swung a pass to Mehkyla White at the top of the key. Without hesitation, White collected the pass, stepped into her shot with poise and the ball went through, hitting nothing but net. 

Even trailing Delaney Dewitt  with her hand up to contest the shot couldn't throw White off on the attempt.

Jefferson seemed deflated when White's shot was successful. That was evident when, after calling a timeout, Morgan Sanderra stole the possession away, raced down the court to put the finishing touches on Eastside’s victory. 

Eastside’s student section and fans went crazy in the Eagles’ Nest.  

While the ending was pretty spectacular, the Lady Eagles’ start was lackluster. 

From the opening tip — after Jefferson won the tipoff and two passes later converted the layup — Eastside trailed. 

At the end of the first quarter, actually, the Lady Eagles found themselves down 26-9. 

Eastside then outscored the Lady Dragons in the second to trim the deficit to 10 points. 

In the third quarter, however, it didn’t seem like the Lady Eagles would eat any further into Jefferson’s advantage.  Each team went back-and-forth in that eight-minute span, with the Lady Eagles winning that frame 11-8. 

But, Eastside flipped the script in the fourth quarter compared to what transpired in the first. 

At the 4:46 mark, Sanderra’s offensive rebound turned layup tied the score up for the first time since it was 0-0 at tipoff. 

In total, the Lady Eagles outscored Jefferson 25-9 in the fourth to complete the 17-point comeback. 

During the majority of the comeback, Sanderra made her presence known. And, while White made arguably the most important shot of the night, Sanderra did everything from scoring to rebounding and everything in between to help her team win. 

In fact, Sanderra scored 12 of her 14 points in the second half, which was the second-most on the team Friday night. 

It was Jailyn Williams who had the most points scoring 18. White was behind Sanderra with 10 points and Aysia Spivey recorded nine. 

As a result of Friday’s win, the Lady Eagles got back to .500 at 10-10 overall with a 4-6 record in Region 8-AAAAA. On top of that, Eastside moves up to fifth place in the region standings and extends its win streak to three games. 

Eastside has just three games remaining on its regular season slate: Jan. 31 at Flowery Branch, Feb. 3 versus Winder-Barrow and Feb. 4 versus Social Circle. 

The Region 8-AAAAA tournament will be held at Winder-Barrow High School on Feb. 13, 15 and 17.