Mercer preps to play abbreviated schedules
Normally, Mercer County’s prep school girls’ basketball teams would have started playing a whole two months ago.
In a world still dominated by the coronavirus, their 2021 season was delayed as were so many others.
Over the course of the next six weeks, four of the six local teams will begin playing games.
The Lawrenceville School announced before the season it would not be playing. The Peddie School will begin practicing Monday and has yet to announce if its teams will be able to play other squads.
Meanwhile, Stuart, Hun, Pennington and Princeton Day School are going to make a go of it.
Ninth-year head coach Justin Leith’s Tartans have the most ambitious schedule with 13 games listed.
After finishing second in the Mercer County Tournament a year ago, Stuart has a talented lineup returning with six seniors, including 6-foot-4 forwards Ariel Jenkins (11.1 points per game) and Laila Fair (9.5 ppg), 5-9 guard/forward Nia Melvin (12.9 ppg) and 5-5 guard Aleah James (8.6 ppg). Jenkins has signed with Georgetown University. Fair has signed with St. Joseph’s University in Philadelphia.
As if their lineup wasn’t loaded enough, the Tartans also received an interesting transfer when Kyla Glasser-Hyman, who averaged 15.2 ppg as a freshman at Hightstown last season, came on board.
“If we are able to play the (NJISAA) Prep B Tournament, of course we would love to win that again,” Leith said. “If we don’t have a postseason, we will look forward to big games like TCA (Feb. 1), Cherokee (Feb. 13) and St. Thomas Aquinas (Feb. 18). The hope is to also pick up a few more challenging games if teams get room on their schedules. At this point, it’s just great that the girls will have the opportunity to have a season.”
Hun won 18 games a year ago and finished as the state runner-up in Prep A. The Raiders will have two key seniors — 5-10 guard/forward Kennedy Jardine (17.2 ppg with 68 3-pointers) and 5-2 guard Izzy Lalo (13.2 ppg with 52 3-pointers) — plus 5-9 postgraduate forward Kennedy Wilburn from Cherokee to keep head coach Bill Holup’s team sharp during their nine-game campaign.
“In my 22 years at Hun, this was the most girls who came out for basketball,” Holup said. “We’d been practicing outside, weather permitting, and were excited to get in the gym. As long as everyone is safe, we’re happy to be getting out there to compete against other schools.”
Though their school website had not posted a schedule as of this weekend, Pennington plans to play in 2021 after slipping a little last season with a very young team. This year’s squad is still a little green, but will have a trio of 5-6 senior guards, twins Sophia and Ava Kavulich, plus Jackie King, to provide leadership.
“We had no seniors last year, so we hope our experience will lead to growth and improvement,” said eighth-year head coach Jeff Eckerson, who will also have 13.2-ppg scorer Mary Kathryn “M.K.” Kramli, a 5-7 junior guard who hit
47 3-pointers last season. “Above all, we hope to enjoy every moment we have on the court together during this challenging year.”
Princeton Day School will have a new head coach who is very familiar with the area. Seraphine Hamilton, who played at Peddie, steps in after Liz Loughlin spent two seasons directing the Panthers.
Though PDS is relatively young, it will have 5-6 senior guards Caroline Topping and Anna Ellwood, plus 5-6 senior forward Anna-Marie Zhang, to provide leadership for the rest of the team during its six games.
“This season is so unpredictable,” Hamilton said. “Our goal is to get better every day, not take a minute on the court for granted and give the seniors a season they can feel proud of. Technically, we want to put pressure on teams and use our athleticism to our advantage by running the floor and playing some hard-nosed defense.”