By Joseph Staszewski
Sabrina Xieng, like many young kids, grew up saying she wanted to study at Harvard, never thinking she would actually get the chance.
“It was a dream to me ever since I was a little girl,” the Benjamin Cardozo senior said. “I would joke around and say I wanted to go there. I didn’t think it would become a reality.”
Not only will Xieng be studying at Harvard, she will also be a member of its tennis team, after a stellar four-year career with the Judges. In addition, she has a better-than-100 grade point average.
She went undefeated in league play over her career and won the PSAL girls’ tennis singles championship twice. She was also instrumental in her team winning a Mayor’s Cup crown and reaching two city championship matches. All of her accolades earned her the league’s Wingate Award, given to the top senior student-athlete in each of their respective sports.
“It’s inspiring really,” Xieng said. “It’s a prestigious honor, just to know that all my dedication and hard work over the years paid off. It’s really rewarding.”
Xieng’s tennis career, which is taking her to Harvard, started by chance. A family friend asked her, along with her father, Jeff, and her sister Christina to accompany them to Arthur Ashe Kids’ Day for the US Open at the U.S. Tennis Center when she was 8 years old.
Afterward, her sister asked her if she was interested in taking lessons with her there. The skill ran in the family, as her dad was an excellent ping-pong player and picked up tennis quickly. Sabrina did the same and was told early on that she was good and should stick with it.
“We would go to the park and just hit with each other,” she said. “We started doing lessons and people started saying you have some talent and I just kept going with it.”
She is currently the No. 74 ranked player in her age group by the USTA and is in the top five on the East Coast.
Xieng played while suffering from a stress fracture in her shin this spring, not knowing how severe the injury was.
“I was in pain, but it was not so much where I thought there was something that I had to rest for so long, so I played through it,” she said “I played through injuries before.”
It is that type of dedication in the classroom and on the court that earned her all her accolades, as well as the opportunity to attend her dream school of Harvard.
