OB Girls Hoops Standout and 1,000 Point Scorer to Play for Lady Peacocks
OLD BRIDGE, NJ—While the boys basketball program at Old Bridge High School has made significant strides since the arrival of head coach Jim Macomber prior to the 2011-12, girls hoops at OBHS has also become a contender under the guidance of head coach Alec Alspach. A good deal of that success could be attributed to four year varsity standout, Rachel Kuhl.
Kuhl, who finished with 1,655 points over her four years at Old Bridge, committed to play for St. Peter’s women’s basketball program back in August 2019, and has since signed her National Letter of Intent with the Jersey City based D1 school. Over the past four years at OBHS, Kuhl played in 94 games, made 363 field goals, 233 three pointers, and 218 foul shots, and averaged 17.6 points per game according to stats compiled at NJ.com.
During her four year tenure in the Knights girls basketball program, Kuhl scored in double figures in 79 of the 94 games that she played in including 34 contests with at least 20 points, 7 games with at least 30 points, and one game with over 40 points. Over that period, Old Bridge compiled an overall record of 48-49 including a mark of 22-30 in the GMC Red. The Lady Knights reached the GMCT Girls Quarterfinals in 3 of the 4 years Kuhl played at the school.
In addition, Old Bridge also made the state tourney twice, reaching the 2017 Central Jersey Group 4 Quarterfinals before falling to neighborhood rival Sayreville of the GMC White. Those Lady Bombers finished 29-3, won the 2017 GMCT Girls crown, and reached the NJSIAA Group 4 Girls Basketball State Championship before falling to Franklin.
Two years later, Old Bridge got some revenge by scoring a 54-46 upset as the 11th seed over 6th seeded Sayreville in the 2019 GMCT Girls Round of 16 before losing to Red Division champ, J.P. Stevens in the quarterfinals at Middlesex County College. Kuhl, who was a junior at the time, was in the midst of her best season, and netted 22 points on a field goal, three treys, and 11 free throws in the win after notching a career high 45 points on 15 field goals and 5 treys in a 73-48 victory over Piscataway Tech in the 2019 GMCT Girls Preliminary Round.
As a junior, Kuhl connected on 140 field goals, 51 threes, and 80 free throws for a total of 513 points in 23 games played for an average of 22.3 points per game. She scored in double figures in 21 of those 23 games including 14 contests of at least 20 points or more, and four games of at least 30 or more including two 37 point performances against Perth Amboy (won 67-40) on December 18, 2018, and versus Metuchen (won 70-60) on January 14, 2019.
Kuhl, who was also a two year varsity volleyball standout at OBHS, was instrumental in helping Old Bridge’s girls hoops team rebuild after a 6-17 season in 2017-18. The Lady Knights finished 10-13 in 2018-19 and 16-9 this past season with berths in the GMCT Elite Eight as well as a state tourney berth. Kuhl has been a GMC All Red Division and All Conference selection three times while also being nominated along with St. Thomas Aquinas’ Emma Boslet to play in the 2020 McDonald’s All American Game back in January.
The Old Bridge girls hoops standout will be joining two former GMC standouts at St. Peter’s: Gabrielle Harris of South River and Kendrea Williams of Piscataway. Both are redshirt juniors at the school, and had previously played Division III women’s hoops at FDU-Florham. Harris is also the daughter of former South River boys basketball head coach, Rodney Harris. This past season the Lady Peacocks went 9-21 overall including a 6-14 mark in the MAAC.
St. Peter’s still managed to improve over the 2018-19 season, where the team only went 6-24 overall including a 1-17 mark in conference play. The season before that, the women’s hoops team was only 4-26. So, the addition of Kuhl along with Harris and Williams should help the Lady Peacocks improve even further in 2020-21.
Congratulations Rachel, and best of luck at the next level.