Nine seniors, one junior and…one freshman.  When Jennifer Parker tried out for girls basketball, she skipped past the freshman and junior varsity teams and snagged a spot on varsity.

“I thought I had a small chance of making varsity, but an even bigger chance of making JV,” Parker said. “I feel like nobody can stop me. My thoughts that were bad throughout that day are gone now.”

Parker, who has been playing for nine years, was inspired by her mom to start playing basketball. She’s been involved in the AAU basketball league and wants to earn a four-year athletic scholarship to play in college. Outside of school practices, Parker spends her weekends practicing her skills on the court.

“She’s a really good basketball player,” freshman Daiza Sullivan said. “She’s a good post and she’s really good at inside shots.”

Sullivan, who plays for the freshman girls team, is close friends with Parker on and off the court.

“Jennifer has been working her tail off to get to where she is,” Sullivan said.

Varsity basketball coach Lori McDonald noticed Parker’s athleticism during tryouts. At 5’11”, Parker is one of the tallest girls in the program, making her reach an advantage to the team.

“She runs the court with the speed of a guard,” McDonald said. “She can also jump; she can jump and touch the backboard two-handed,” McDonald said. “You don’t see that a lot in high school girls’ basketball.”

Parker is the first or second sub in each game. She makes the effort to play a part in each and every game, no matter how small.

“Jennifer is aggressive on defense and can jump and get rebounds,” McDonald said. “She’s tough inside and frustrates the post players that she guards. She also does a good job posting up, and she fits in well with the rest of the varsity players. She’s been working hard to fix some of the ‘freshman’ mistakes she was making earlier in the season.”

McDonald continues to watch as Parker’s confidence grows each day. Meanwhile, Parker’s next goal is to become more of a scoring threat.

“She has the ability, she just needs to take the aggressive nature we see on the defensive end and convert that to the offensive end,” McDonald said. “Once she becomes a threat on both ends of the court, she will be a force that will be hard for other teams to stop.”

With 11 games under their belt, including a record high 97 points against St. Dominic Savio last Tuesday, Parker and the varsity girls are ready for district. Parker hopes to help the team reach the playoffs again and is looking forward most to the Vista Ridge match-up.

With the team opening district today at Vandegrift, Parker is bound to hear the phrase people have been asking after seeing her on the court, a question she gets a kick out of.

“[I love] hearing people say one thing, ‘She’s just a freshman?’ ”