Female Athlete of the Week could go down as one of her school’s best

Memo to Rocco Minichiello: Your argument as the best athlete in the family is losing a little oomph.

Hasbrouck Heights three-sport star Gina Minichiello, Rocco’s younger sister, continues to set records and win golds in every sport she plays. She’s coming off championships at the Bergen County group track meet in the 400 hurdles, 100-meter and 200-meter dashes, plus the long jump. She scored 40 out of 40 possible points.

Minichiello can now add Female Athlete of the Week, presented by HSS, to her resume. Take that, big brother. Though, to be fair, Rocco was a football standout at Heights.

“I am definitely competitive with him and my sister Mia, but maybe not as much as you would think,” Gina said. “Mia never did track, but my brother did more sports especially when we were young. I always say I am the best athlete of the three. My brother will argue it.”

To Hasbrouck Heights veteran track coach Rob Brady, who has seen just about every great athlete in town for the last 50 years, Gina ranks as one of the best.

“I feel Gina is one of the best all-around athletes in school history,” Brady said. “And she will leave as one of the most accomplished athletes male or female in school history. She already has a state group title in track. She has already been all-county and has already qualified for outdoor nationals.”

And Gina has done all this while playing three varsity sports in high school. Gina, 16, was third-team All-Bergen County in soccer after scoring 22 goals and had 11 assists last fall. She was second-team All-County in girls basketball and was the second leading scorer in North Jersey last season. She has a good shot at becoming the school’s first 2,000-point scorer.

What’s her secret? Just work, every day.

“Being consistent,” Gina said. “Every day at track practice, you’re doing something different, and you want to make sure you are recovering on the easy days and then you know there are the hard days when you’re doing 400-hurdle workouts and that’s what you have to do to get better. There’s no way around it.”

Entering Hasbrouck Heights, Gina wasn’t 100 percent going to go out for track, because she had played so much softball growing up. But the lure of some friends and Brady swayed her.

“I think we were very fortunate that a lot of her friends from soccer in her freshman year were track athletes,” Brady said. “She naturally wanted to be around good kids that she played with, like Lexy Samperi and Morgan Gagliano.”

“I just gave it a shot,” Gina said. “I had never run track before.”

Gina doesn’t have a favorite sport of the three. When it’s fall, she’s committed to soccer, when it’s winter, it’s basketball time, and in the spring, she’s on the run.

“Track is so much different from my other sports, it’s the one sport I get the most nervous about,” Gina said. “I think it’s the group of girls, and it’s this bond that you build all struggling together and you want to do well. I love the individual part and I love how the results are based on how hard I work. I don’t have to rely on anyone else.”

Gina confesses to one superstition: Scrambled eggs and sourdough bread for breakfast. She gets nervous and bites her nails, a habit she’s trying to stop.

Gina is also in the school’s National Honor Society, is editor of the school’s paper “The Pilot’s Log” and is a member of the wellness club. She’d like to study physical or occupational therapy in college, but where and what sport she hasn’t decided.

“I’m going in June to see the Naval Academy,” Gina said. “I have been thinking about Florida, but I do want to stay around sports.”

Gina Minichiello

Sport: Track and field

School: Hasbrouck Heights

Class: Junior Age: 16

Accomplishment: Minichiello, a three-sport standout, won four events at the Bergen County group meet: the 400 hurdles, the 200- and 100-meter dashes and the long jump.