In recent years, the Hackley Girls Squash team has been a dominant powerhouse, winning consecutive Ivy League Championships the last four seasons. The team ended their 2024 season undefeated in the Ivy League and pulled off an upset to beat The Spence School in the NYSAIS championship after entering the tournament as the 4th seed. Much of the team’s success over the past four years can be credited to senior captain Caroline Didden.
Sophomore Julia Feehan has played alongside Caroline for the past two years and values her guidance.
“Caroline is the embodiment of leadership,” Julia said, “She’s always there cheering the team on and works super hard all the time.”
Caroline came to Hackley in 6th grade and started playing squash in 7th grade where the girls ended up winning a Division II national title. Caroline moved out of the Upper East Side in 6th grade to Briarcliff Manor which gave her more opportunities to play squash, considering she was much closer to courts at Hackley and in Briarcliff.
She started taking her squash career more seriously in her freshman year.
“I realized squash was something that I was pretty good at, and I enjoyed playing in my free time, so I started to put more effort in,” Caroline said.
Caroline started playing at MSquash in Port Chester, New York in her freshman year while also playing in tournaments that are divided into three levels: bronze, silver, and gold. With hard work and determination, Caroline eventually worked her way up to gold. Caroline currently has a 4.4 ranking, and is 7th in New York for girls, and 65th in the country. The ranking system for squash doesn’t have a maximum, but the number one male in the world is Ali Farag with an 8.35. Nour El Sherbini is the number one female in the world with a 7.3 ranking. Caroline’s record is currently 21-0 in the Tri-State area.
Caroline’s hard work and dedication for the past four years paid off and led her to many opportunities. She spent the past summer playing in the Portuguese and Italian Opens, placing 3rd in Portugal and 10th in Italy. She also had a solid performance in the U.S. Open in New Jersey.
Caroline recently committed to Middlebury College in Vermont to play squash at the collegiate level. Talking about the recruitment process Caroline said, “It was stressful because I had to match my academic and athletic goals. I narrowed it down and Middlebury was my top choice and checked all my boxes.” She hopes to continue her squash career and make it to the Olympics, but her overall goal is just to play squash as long as she can.
