BANNER YEAR: Princeton High girls’ basketball star Anna Winters dribbles upcourt against Notre Dame in the Colonial Valley Conference (CVC) Tournament championship game. Senior star guard Winters scored 25 points in the game to help PHS prevail 57-52 and win its first-ever CVC title. Winters, who was named the tournament MVP, who tallied 413 points with 116 rebounds, 130 assists, and 93 steals this winter to end her PHS career with 1,563 points, 590 rebounds, 412 assists, and 384 steals. (Photo by Frank Jacobs III)

By Bill Alden

Anna Winters and her fellow seniors on the Princeton High girls’ basketball team came into this winter determined to make history in their final campaign with the program.

“We definitely want to put something on that empty banner in our gym,” said Winters. “We have been saying that since freshman year. We are really set on that and we really think we can do it this year.”

In order to achieve that goal, the Tigers had to develop into a unit.

“I think we are going to have to just keep playing as a team,” said Winters. “We are going to have to move the ball, be tough, and work together.”

It took a while for PHS to hit its stride as it got off to a 3-3 start.

“We were still getting adjusted, it is a new coach (Mary Pat Lelinski). It is all different,” said Winters, noting that it was the third head coach for the team in the last three years. “Every coach that we have had has been completely different in their own way. Coach knows basketball, I think she is leading our team in a good direction.”

The Tigers got going in the right direction, reeling off nine straight wins to start January.

Being seeded second for the Colonial Valley Conference (CVC) Tournament, PHS lived up to that ranking. The Tigers topped 15th seeded WW/P-North 52-21 in a first round contest and then defeated seventh-seeded Steinert 53-42 in the quarterfinals. Overcoming a long-time nemesis, the Tigers edged third-seeded Ewing 55-51 in a semifinal showdown.

In the final, PHS defeated fifth-seeded and defending CVC champion Notre Dame 57-52 in the final to earn a title that will be etched on the banner hanging in the Tiger gym.

“This one was just heart and determination to win this game,” said Winters, reflecting on the win over the Irish. “In the last quarter, it was a close game. We knew we were not going to win this game by playing individually like we were in the first half. It was playing together and putting our hearts into it. I think that is what really won it. Just working together as a team was really important.”

Winters exploded for 11 points in the third quarter of the contest to help the Tigers seize momentum and was named the tournament MVP.

“I made one three and I was like we have come back,” said Winters, who ended up with 25 points, eight assists, five rebounds, and five steals in the final. “I saw the scoreboard and knew we had to push through that. I don’t know what happened, I just felt good. I was playing hard.”

PHS head coach Mary Pat Lelinski credited Winters with leaving an indelible legacy in program annals.

“She is the greatest girl player in school history,” said Lelinski of Winters who ended up with 1,563 points in her career along with 590 rebounds, 412 assists, and 384 steals. “It is not just the scoring, she was leading the CVC in assists and steals.”

In reflecting on the team’s championship run, Winters pointed to the bonds forged by the senior stars.

“I think consistency because a lot of us have been playing together for a long time,” said Winters, who tallied 413 points with 116 rebounds, 130 assists, and 93 steals as PHS ended the winter with a 20-8 record as it advanced to the quarterfinal round of the New Jersey State Interscholastic Athletic Association (NJSIAA) Central Jersey Group 4 Tournament. “I have been playing with Katie [Sharkey] since sixth grade and we have a really good chemistry. I would say Leah [Bornstein] and Sephora [Romain] have all stepped it up so much this year. We had the opportunity to win last year but this year is our last year and we had to make a statement.”

For stepping up in such a big way in helping the PHS girls’ hoops program make history, Winters is the choice as the top girl performer of the winter season.

MAKING STRIDES: Hun School boys’ hockey player Zach Vallee speeds up the ice in a game this winter. Junior newcomer Vallee made an immediate impact for Hun as it went 12-11 this season, more than doubling its win total from the 2024-25 campaign when it went 5-15-1. (Photo by Frank Jacobs III)

Top Boy Performer

Coming into his junior season with the Hun School boys’ basketball team, Blake Hargrove was determined to hone his all-around game.

“Last year, I felt like I was a scoring type of guard,” said Hargrove. “This year I really found out that I have to pass. That is something that really improved my game. It is definitely the
IQ part.”

In an early season 92-57 win over Germantown Academy (Pa.), Hargrove displayed his more complete game.

“They trusted me to shoot the ball in that instance so it was just me going out there and shooting the ball,” said Hargrove, who ended up with 20 points on the night. “I was feeling great. Every shot was going in and I just kept shooting.”

Hun head coach Jon Stone credited Hargrove with making an impact all over the court in that victory.

“Blake has the ability to do it on both ends, I think he had at least two steals in the stretch that led to easy baskets,” said Stone. “He got his hands on a lot of balls. He got rebounds. He can get to the rim, he can shoot the three. He does so much for us at both ends.”

Hargrove kept doing it all for the Raiders as the winter unfolded, scoring more than 20 or more points in seven of the team’s last 15 games as the Raiders went 17-10, nearly doubling its win total after going 9-17 in 2024-25.

Playing a key role in that progress, Hargrove ended up averaging 18.1 points, 5.6 rebounds, 3.7 assists, and 1.8 steals a game on the season.

“He and Sage [Mateo] tied for leading assists, I think he was second in rebounds, he led the team in steals and he led it in deflections,” said Stone. “His numbers are really, really good and yet he has work to do. He can still get better.”

In Hargrove’s view, working hard on a daily basis was the key to Hun’s success this winter.

“It is definitely our practices; we have more intense practices now, we came out a little bit soft but now we are really getting to it,”
said Hargrove. “The scout team is really pushing us
to become better every single day.”

Hargrove’s all-around excellence in helping Hun produce a superb campaign makes him the pick as the top boy performer.

Top Newcomers

Pat Reddington sensed that freshman Alana Williams would make an immediate impact this winter in her freshman season for the Princeton Day School girls’ basketball team.

“Alana is a supreme athlete, she is extremely fast,” said PDS head coach Reddington. “She is playing high-level basketball in the offseason, she plays for Philadelphia Rise. We are really excited about her impact, she is a hard worker. Not only is she a great athlete but she impacts the game in so many different ways that we are really excited about.”

Williams, for her part, knew that moving up to the high school level wouldn’t be easy.

“The biggest challenge is adjusting to the bigger girls,” said Williams. “I am obviously a small guard as a freshman. I am driving and using my abilities.”

Displaying her ability and grit, Williams developed a comfort level in running the Panther offense.

“It has been wonderful, I am used to AAU basketball,” said Williams, who plays for the Philadelphia Rise. “I am just being a point guard and doing my role.”

As PDS went 16-9 and reached the semifinal round of the Colonial Valley Conference (CVC) Tournament, Williams played a key role in that success. She ended up with 338 points, 125 rebounds, 117 assists, and 101 steals.

“Alana was huge as a freshman coming to a new school with a bunch of new girls,” said Reddington. “She has a very impressive demeanor and composure. Even in the biggest moments, she seems to be even-keeled. We are constantly learning. That is the thing about her, she is never going to stop.

For producing such an impressive debut season for PDS, Williams is the choice as the top girl newcomer this winter.

For Canadian native Zach Vallee, joining the Hun School boys’ hockey team this winter has been a one-of-a-kind experience.

“It is the dream, I have been enjoying myself a lot,” said junior forward Vallee,
a native of Pont-Rouge, Quebec.

Vallee quickly developed into a key player for the Raiders.

“Coach (NG Welsh) told me I have a big role,” said Vallee. “That role is a big job. It is pushing the team, it works out.”

The addition of Vallee this winter gave Hun a top offensive threat.

“Zach has an ability to score from anywhere,” said Welsh. “To have a guy who can score from anywhere in any situation is extremely helpful. You know that every game you are walking into he has got a better than not chance of scoring.”

As Hun reached the final of the National Capital Hockey Purple Puck Tournament in the Washington, D.C. area in late December, Vallee proved to be a catalyst, scoring four goals and had two assists in the event.

“Zach is our most skilled player, he can take over a game whenever he wants,” said Hun assistant coach Kevin Morello. “That is pretty much expected of him. When you get the help around him and everyone is jumping on board, that is huge.

Playing in the U.S. helped Vallee’s game. “The level of hockey is a little bit harder here,” said Vallee, whose production helped Hun go 12-11 this season, more than doubling its win total from the 2024-25 campaign when it went 5-15-1. “Playing against stronger players helps you develop yourself.”

Making an immediate impact as he came from Canada and helped spark Hun to a reversal of fortune gets him the nod as the top boy newcomer.

GETTING IT DOWN PAT: Princeton High girls’ basketball head coach Mary Pat Lelinski looks to fire up her players as they competed against Notre Dame in the Colonial Valley Conference (CVC) Tournament championship game. Lelinski guided the Tigers to a 57-52 win over the Irish as the program earned its first CVC crown. PHS ended up going 20-8, setting a single-season program record for wins. (Photo by Frank Jacobs III)

Top Coaches

As the third head coach in the last three years for the Princeton High girls’ basketball team, Mary Pat Lelinski was looking to run a tighter ship to help a veteran group achieve its goals.

“I said that there was going to be some changes, that there was going to be clearer expectations and consequences for not meeting those in terms of rules and stuff,” said Lelinski. “Also at the same token with the group that we are returning, the expectation is that we want to win a championship. I didn’t have to tell them that, they already had that in mind.”

In pursuing the goal of a championship, Lelinski revamped the Tiger offense and put a greater emphasis in defensive play.

“We do have different plays and right now and they are learning them and that will take care of itself,” said Lelinski. “We are trying to do more instruction on defense. There is a lot more stress on that because through playing good defense, we get the ball back more often. It is also rebounding. We rely on our shooting percentage and we didn’t necessarily crash the boards last year. That has been a big emphasis since the beginning of the year.”

As the Tigers went through their preseason practices, Lelinski liked the way her players responded to the changes.

“I think it has been pretty positive, it is a big change for them,” said Lelinski. “This is their third head coach in three years, but I think that they welcome it. They have really given us a chance and that is what we asked them to do. We said give us a chance and if it goes bottom up at some point then we will have to talk about it but right now it is good.”

Hitting some bumps in the road as it started 3-3, PHS got in a groove as it produced a nine-game winning streak in January.

“There were times were there was adversity and they could have gone either way,” said Lelinski. “They could have started to point fingers. There was some growing pains of learning how to become a good teammate and learning how everyone has to have the same goal. All of those times that they were tested, they didn’t turn and point fingers. They just came closer together. That is all them.”

The closeness helped spark a run to the Colonial Valley Conference (CVC) Tournament final which saw the second-seeded Tigers pull out a 57-52 win over fifth-seeded and defending champion Notre Dame to win the program’s first-ever CVC title. The Tigers went on to finish the winter with a 20-8 record as they set a new program record for single-season victories.

Lelinski credited her quartet of seniors stars, Anna Winters, Katie Sharkey, Leah Bornstein and Sephora Romain, with sparking the historic run.

“I have told them over and over again this year that there will never be a team that I feel is going to top this team in school history with what they have accomplished,” said Lelinski of the group whose goal was to put a title on the team’s empty banner hanging in the PHS gym. “The four of them were on varsity as freshmen. They have never had a losing season in the four years and the last two years, it is 39-18.”

While PHS produced a happy ending, the journey wasn’t always smooth.

“I really feel like through that process everybody became a lot closer,” said Lelinski. “It was a nice experience to know that you can have adversity and if you handle it, your relationship comes out stronger. What a great life message that is.”

Leading PHS through the ups and downs to a championship in her first season at the helm of the program, Lelinski is the pick as the top coach of a girls’ team.

With the Princeton High boys’ swimming team having lost Daniel Guo, David Brophy and the Xu twins, David and Jaiden to graduation after they helped the Tigers go 49-4 over the last four years, the program faced a rebuild this winter.

“The boys’ team is so young,” said PHS head coach Patrick Remboski. “We lost a lot of talent from last year.”

But with its young swimmers stepping up, the Tigers got off to an encouraging 3-0 start.

While PHS did take some lumps in losing meets to powerhouses WW/P-South and Bridgewater-Raritan, they took some valuable lessons from those setbacks.

Competing at the Colonial Valley Conference (CVC) Swimming Championships in late January, the Tigers took third as such young swimmers as freshman Stephen Baytin and sophomore Eito Sakaguchi stepped up. Baytin took fourth in the 200-meter individual medley and third in the 400 freestyle while Sakaguchi placed fourth in the 50 free and third in the 100 free.

Building on that performance, third-seeded PHS defeated sixth-seeded South Plainfield 99-71 in the quarterfinal round of the New Jersey State Interscholastic Athletic Association (NJSIAA) North 2, Group B tournament.

“They were gearing up for that meet, we have a pretty large freshman class with 10 guys,” said Remboski, reflecting on the win. “It was super helpful for us this year after losing all of those seniors. They were great. It was their first state meet, they had the CVC tournament but this is a dual meet.”

While PHS fell 100-70 to second-seeded and eventual sectional champion Scotch Plains-Fanwood in the semifinal round, that loss didn’t dim the progress made by the team’s new faces as the Tigers finished the winter with an 8-3 record.

“It was the young guys filling in the gaps,” said Remboski, whose freshman standouts included Natan Wysocki, Jayden Zheng, and Jason Zhu in addition to Baytin. “Before the season started and we got the official list of who registered, we were a little bit nervous after losing all of these seniors. We were concerned about how we were going to fill certain roles and then we got this freshman group in and Eito transferring in. We also had another transfer, Abhinav Sukla, who is a junior. He was a tremendous help for us as well. We had 12 newcomers.”

For helping those newcomers come together as they maintained the program’s high standards, Remboski is the pick as the top coach of a boys’ team.