Howell High School’s Barbara Podvorchani has become the face of Freehold Regional High School District (FRHSD) girls tennis.
While Marlboro High School maintained its hold on the Shore Conference A North Division and a firm grip as the district’s best team, Podvorchani has emerged as the area’s best player.
The Rebels’ sophomore went through the regular season undefeated, dominating opponents with her versatility. She can overpower players with her ground strokes and take control of a point. She can also play defense with the best of them because of natural speed, which allows her to run shots down and keep the ball in play until her opponent makes an unforced error. She played a match to three sets only once during the regular season.
Podvorchani wears her love of tennis on her sleeve. Everything about the way she plays displays her sheer joy.
“I like winning and I like competing,” she said.
She did plenty of that, reaching the third round of the NJSIAA Singles Tournament. As a sophomore, there is a lot more winning in Podvorchani’s future. Winning has been the norm for Marlboro’s girls, and they owned A North again because of their balance. They went trough the A North schedule undefeated and finished the season with an overall record of 14-3. They made it to the NJSIAA Central Jersey, Group IV quarterfinals.
Freehold Township High School joined the Shore’s top programs this fall, going 12-3. The Patriots lost only to Marlboro twice in A North play and to Montgomery High School in the state quarterfinals.
Freehold High School remained one of the Shore’s best teams, going 11-6 and reaching the quarterfinals of the Central Jersey Group III tournament.
The News Transcript’s 2015 All- FRHSD Team has Podvorchani, Marlboro’s Celine Lee and Raquel Rosen and Freehold’s Anjali Prabhat and Alexis Yu at singles.
The doubles teams are Shelby Rush and Grace Zhang from Marlboro and Freehold Township’s Jillian Heun and Marisa Wu.